Jared Bernstein is an American economist who chaired the White House Council of Economic Advisers from 2023 to 2025, capping a career built around one question: how the economy works for people who earn paychecks rather than collect dividends. A jazz double-bassist turned social worker turned policy economist, he spent decades at the Economic Policy Institute, advised Joe Biden as his chief economist, and championed full employment and rising wages for low- and middle-income workers. He is the author of Crunch and The Reconnection Agenda, a longtime CNBC contributor, and a prolific blogger and columnist.
Jim Tankersley is the New York Times Berlin bureau chief and a longtime economics journalist who spent 17 years dissecting Washington's tax fights and the fortunes of the American middle class. A small-town Oregon kid turned Stanford grad, he broke major scoops on the Biden economic agenda, won the Livingston Award, was part of a Pulitzer-finalist team, and wrote 'The Riches of This Land,' a narrative reckoning with what happened to the postwar middle-class dream. In 2025 he traded the West Wing for Germany.