Alan Krueger Papers

Krueger, Alan B.

Alan Krueger (1960-2019) was an economist who served as Chairman of the Council on Economic Advisers under the Obama administration. Born in Livingston, New Jersey, Krueger earned a B.S. in Industrial and Labor Relations from Cornell University in 1983 and an A.M. and Ph.D. in Economics from Harvard University in 1985 and 1987, respectively. Krueger was an Assistant Professor of Economics and Public Affairs in Princeton University's Department of Economics and Woodrow Wilson School from 1987 to 1992. In July 1992, Krueger began serving as the Bendheim Professor of Economics and Public Policy. He was also the Founding Director of Princeton's Survey Research Center. Krueger started his career in government service in August 1994, when he became Chief Economist of the U.S. Department of Labor. He later worked in the Department of the Treasury, serving as Chief Economist from February 2009 to November 2010 and as Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy from May 2009 to November 2010. On November 3, 2011, the U.S. Senate approved Krueger's appointment as Chairman of the Council on Economic Advisers. He served on the Council until August 2013. Krueger authored eight books and numerous papers on various economic issues, including unemployment, minimum wage and wage structure, and the economics of educational practices. He was also a regular contributor to The New York Times economics blog from 2000 to 2006. Krueger died in 2019.

The Alan Krueger Papers consist of materials from the breadth of his career, including research projects, research materials, publication drafts, teaching files, Council on Economic Advisors (CEA) memoranda and subject files, and a series of oral history interviews with Krueger regarding his time on the CEA.

The largest grouping of materials are assorted research materials pertaining to various projects Krueger was involved in. Some of the research materials that were tightly focused on specific projects have been arranged in the Projects series, grouped by project. There are also general correspondence and administrative files as well as a significant amount of teaching materials from Krueger's time as a professor at Princeton. Publications and drafts appear throughout and are arranged in the finding aid in a separate series.

The CEA Files series documents Alan Krueger's tenure as Chairman of the Council on Economic Advisers from November 2011 to August 2013. It contains Kruger's memoranda to Barack Obama, primarily in the form of monthly economic briefings, and Krueger's speeches given at various events. To a lesser extent, the series includes Kruger's subject files on topics such as "academic economics," energy, fiscal policy, and labor. Also present are pictures of Krueger taken by the White House photographer and others, including Krueger's personal collection of digitized photographs of himself with President Obama in both formal and informal settings.

Finally, there is a group of oral history transcripts from interviews that Sean Vanatta (*18) conducted with Krueger at his request in 2013. These interviews were intended by Krueger to capture his experiences on the CEA.

The file descriptions have been organized into series, but no physical arrangement was done during 2024 processing. The CEA Files series was arranged by document type prior to acquisition by the Mudd Library.

The digital files in this collection were collected from Alan Krueger by Sean Vanatta, a PhD student in Princeton University's Department of History, who consulted the files in preparation for a series of interviews he conducted with Krueger. Mr. Vanatta created an organizational structure for the files prior to their acquisition by the Mudd Library.

The initial born-digital materials in this collection was donated by Sean Vanatta on behalf of Alan Krueger in October 2014. The accession number associated with this donation is ML.2014.036.

Additional materials were donated by Lisa Krueger ni 2019 and 2021. The accession numbers associated with these donations are ML-2019-021 and ML-2021-021.

For preservation reasons, original analog and digital media may not be read or played back in the reading room. Users may visually inspect physical media but may not remove it from its enclosure. All analog audiovisual media must be digitized to preservation-quality standards prior to use. Audiovisual digitization requests are processed by an approved third-party vendor. Please note, the transfer time required can be as little as several weeks to as long as several months and there may be financial costs associated with the process. Requests should be directed through the Ask Us Form.

This collection contains materials acquired from a laptop computer running Windows. Researchers are responsible for meeting the technical requirements needed to access these materials, including any and all hardware and software.

The initial accession was processed by Rachel Van Unen in 2014 at the time of accessioning. Files were run through the Mudd Library's digital curation procedures and described in a collection-level finding aid. All original folder and file names created by the donor have been maintained.

Additional materials donated in 2019 and 2021 were processed by Will Clements, with assistance from Maya Houser ('22) and Santiago Castro Carrillo, and completed in 2024.

Audio files of interviews with Krueger and partial transcripts of these interviews were removed from the collection at the request of Professor Krueger. Personal materials unrelated to his professional career were also removed, as were some materials personally identifiable information and student work.

Use

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Preferred Citation

Alan Krueger Collection, 2011-2013, Public Policy Papers, Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

Publisher

Public Policy Papers

Date

2014

Creator

Krueger, Alan B.

People

Obama, Barack

Organization

Council of Economic Advisers (U.S.)

Place

United States -- Economic conditions -- 21st century

Language

English

Form

born digital