Volcker to Head Panel on Public Service
Retiring Federal Reserve Board Chairman Paul A. Volcker, claiming the government is having an increasingly difficult time recruiting and holding onto high-quality officials, announced Thursday that he will head a new privately funded commission on public service.
The two-year commission, to be made up of “nationally recognized and public-spirited citizens,” will seek to recommend ways to make government service more attractive, Volcker, 59, told the Senate Banking Committee.
Volcker, 59, announced on June 2 that he would retire after serving as eight years as head of the nation’s powerful central bank.
In his first public statement on what he intends to do in his retirement, Volcker, who has spent most of his career serving the government, said the problem of quality government service had been one of “some concern” to him.
“I don’t think that quality is going up. I think that quality is going down,” Volcker said. He said that it is becoming more difficult to persuade talented individuals to come to work for the government, particularly young people.
Volcker said he will serve, without pay, as chairman of a privately funded “National Commission on the Public Service.”
Start your day right
Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
