home > about cfr > leadership and staff > robert e. rubin
Co-Chairman; Former Secretary of the U.S. Treasury
Mr. Rubin served as our nation’s 70th Secretary of the Treasury from 1995-1999. As Secretary, Mr. Rubin played a leading role in many of the nation’s most important policy debates. He was involved in balancing the federal budget; opening trade policy to further globalization; acting to stem financial crises in Mexico, Asia and Russia; helping to resolve the impasse over the public debt limit; safeguarding the nation’s currency against counterfeiting; and guiding sensible reforms at the Internal Revenue Service.
Long active in public affairs, Mr. Rubin first joined the Clinton Administration in 1993 as Director of the newly-created National Economic Council. Under Mr. Rubin’s guidance, the NEC oversaw the Administration’s domestic and international economic policymaking process, coordinated economic policy recommendations to the President and monitored the implementation of the President’s economic policy goals.
Mr. Rubin began his career in finance at Goldman, Sachs & Company in New York City in 1966. Mr. Rubin served as Vice-Chairman and Co-Chief Operating Officer from 1987-1990 and as Co-Senior Partner and Co-Chairman from 1990-1992. Before joining Goldman, he was an attorney at the firm of Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton in New York City.
From 1999 to 2009, Mr. Rubin served as a member of the Board of Directors at Citigroup and as a senior advisor to the company. In addition, he worked extensively with the firm’s clients around the world. On January 9th, he announced his intention to retire from the company and not stand for reelection as a Board member.
Mr. Rubin is the Chairman of the Board of the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) which is the nation’s leading community development support organization with 38 offices nationwide. At the White House and Treasury, Mr. Rubin was a leading advocate for policy actions that met the need for economic development in the Nation’s distressed urban and rural areas.
In 2006, Mr. Rubin was one of the founders of The Hamilton Project, an economic policy project housed at the Brookings Institution that offers a strategic vision and innovative policy proposals on how to create a growing economy that benefits more Americans.
Mr. Rubin is the author of In An Uncertain World: Tough Choices from Wall Street to Washington [Random House, 2003, with Jacob Weisberg], which was a New York Times bestseller as well as being named one of Business Week’s ten best business books of the year.
In 2003, he was named Vice Chairman of the Council on Foreign Relations and in 2007, he was named Co-Chairman. Mr. Rubin also serves on the Board of Trustees of Mount Sinai Medical Center. In 2000, he became a member of the Advisory Board of Insight Venture Partners, a New York-based private-equity investment firm that specializes in e-commerce business-to-business companies. He is also a member of the Harvard Corporation.
Mr. Rubin graduated summa cum laude from Harvard College in 1960 with an A.B. in economics. He received a L.L.B. from Yale Law School in 1964 and attended the London School of Economics. He was born in New York City in 1938 and is married to Judith Oxenberg Rubin, who served as the New York City Commissioner of Protocol for four years under Mayor David Dinkins. The Rubins have two adult sons, James and Philip.
Past Research Project
October 16, 2009
Video
Watch experts analyze the economic effects of pandemic influenza including on the labor force and trade.
This session was part of a CFR symposium, Pandemic Influenza: Science, Economics, and Foreign Policy, which was cosponsored with Science Magazine.
See more in Economics, Global Health
October 16, 2009
Audio
Listen to experts analyze the economic effects of pandemic influenza including on the labor force and trade.
This session was part of a CFR symposium, Pandemic Influenza: Science, Economics, and Foreign Policy, which was cosponsored with Science Magazine.
See more in Economics, Public Health Threats
October 16, 2009
Transcript
Session II of a Council on Foreign Relations Symposium on Pandemic Influenza: Science, Economics and Foreign Policy. Subject: Economic Aspects of Pandemic Influenza
See more in Technology and Foreign Policy, Health
September 21, 2009, New York.
Transcript
President of the Republic of Korea Lee Myung-bak details U.S.-Korean relations including matters such as security and trade.
This meeting was cosponsored with the Asia Society and the Korea Society.
See more in South Korea, Diplomacy
September 21, 2009
Video
Watch President of the Republic of Korea Lee Myung-bak detail U.S.-Korean relations including matters such as security and trade.
This meeting was cosponsored with the Asia Society and the Korea Society.
September 21, 2009
Audio
Listen to President of the Republic of Korea Lee Myung-bak detail U.S.-Korean relations including matters such as security and trade.
This meeting was cosponsored with the Asia Society and the Korea Society.
See more in South Korea
March 30, 2009
Audio
Listen to experts give a historical analysis of the 1920s and the causes of the Great Depression, including monetary policy and the stock market crash in 1929.
This session was part of the CFR-New York University Leonard N. Stern School of Business symposium: A Second Look at the Great Depression, which was made possible through the generous support of the Leonard N. Stern School of Business, New York University, and the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.
See more in Economics, Financial Crises
March 30, 2009
Video
Watch experts give a historical analysis of the 1920s and the causes of the Great Depression, including monetary policy and the stock market crash in 1929.
This session was part of the CFR-New York University Leonard N. Stern School of Business symposium: A Second Look at the Great Depression, which was made possible through the generous support of the Leonard N. Stern School of Business, New York University, and the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.
See more in Economics, Financial Crises
March 30, 2009, New York
Transcript
Session One of a Council on Foreign Relations Symposium on a Second Look at the Great Depression and the New Deal. A panel focusing on what occurred economically during the 1920s that contributed to the Crash in 1929.
See more in United States, Economics
November 14, 2008
Transcript
Gordon Brown, prime minister of the United Kingdom, speaks about the global financial crisis and the need for international cooperation to mitigate its effects.
See more in Economics, Geoeconomics
November 14, 2008
Video
Watch Gordon Brown, prime minister of the United Kingdom, speak about the global financial crisis and the need for international cooperation to mitigate its effects.
See more in Financial Crises, Geoeconomics, Trade
November 14, 2008
Audio
Listen to Gordon Brown, prime minister of the United Kingdom, speak about the global financial crisis and the need for international cooperation to mitigate its effects.
See more in Financial Crises, Geoeconomics, Trade
November 6, 2008
Audio
Watch Samuel J. Palmisano, chairman, president, and chief executive officer of IBM Corporation, discuss the importance of technology to modern lives, from health care and infrastructure to the financial markets.
November 6, 2008
Video
Watch Samuel J. Palmisano, chairman, president, and chief executive officer of IBM Corporation, discuss the importance of technology to modern lives, from health care and infrastructure to the financial markets.
See more in Technology and Foreign Policy, Health, Science, and Technology
November 6, 2008
Transcript
A address by Samuel Palmisano, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of IBM Corporation
See more in United States, Financial Crises
September 25, 2006
Video
Watch Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf discuss his new memoir, terrorism, and U.S.-Pakistan relations.
See more in Pakistan
September 25, 2006
Transcript
General Pervez Musharraf, president of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, discusses his new book, In the Line of Fire, and then answers questions about Pakistan’s internal and external relations, terrorism, and its relationship with America.
See more in Afghanistan, Pakistan
September 25, 2006
Audio
Listen to Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf discuss his new memoir, terrorism, and U.S.-Pakistan relations.
See more in Pakistan
May 19, 2005
Audio
See more in Economics
December 17, 2004
Transcript
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