Joel Michaels

Joel Michaels is a Fellow in Public Economic Law at Columbia Law School. He writes about how administrative, banking, and budget laws shape spending and investment decisions. Recent work has examined the regulatory architecture of industrial policy and the ways that bank capital requirements embed non-prudential policy considerations. 

Prior to joining Columbia, Michaels was a Senior Advisor at the U.S. Department of the Treasury. In that capacity, he was the policy lead for the $350 billion State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds program and advised Treasury’s leadership on government-sponsored enterprises, housing policy, and clean energy tax credits. In a previous role, he served in the Office of Management and Budget’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) as part of the team designing a modernization of the regulatory review process.

Michaels holds a J.D. from Yale Law School and a B.A. with High Honors from Wesleyan University’s College of Social Studies.