Comment on "'Fiscal Devaluation' and Fiscal Consolidation: The VAT in Troubled Times"

In addition to my role as a faculty member at MIT, I am engaged in a number of outside activities. In the last three years, I have been:

(i) President of the National Bureau of Economic Research, a non-profit organization devoted to economic research (www.nber.org).

(ii) Trustee of the College Retirement Equity Fund (CREF) and independent director of the TIAA-CREF mutual funds (www.tiaa-cref.org).

(iii) Trustee of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (www.sloan.org). (since June 2009)

(iv) Member of the Panel of Economic Advisers at the Congressional Budget Office (www.cbo.gov).

(v) Director, the Jeffrey Company and the Jeflion Company. (until June 2010)

(vi) I periodically receive compensation for lectures or presentations. During the last three years, I have received amounts in excess of $500 from each of the following organizations: The Bradley Foundation, Clemson University, Dimensional Fund Advisers, DuPont, the Economic and Social Research Institute (Dublin), the Institute for Fiscal Studies (London), the Investment Company Institute, the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, the Oxford University Press, Tulane University, the University of Illinois, and the University of Wisconsin.