Fed Names Andreessen, Mankiw, McMillon to Warsh's Five Monetary Policy Task Forces

WASHINGTON, The Federal Reserve on Thursday named 15 external advisers to five independent task forces charged with reviewing how the central bank conducts monetary policy, a move that places tech investors, former central bank governors, and prominent academic economists at the center of the institution's biggest internal rethink in recent memory.

Chairman Kevin Warsh, who took over the Fed in May, announced the rosters in a press release reviewed by ETL Newswire. The five panels will examine communications, balance sheet policy, data, productivity and jobs, and inflation frameworks.

Among the more prominent names: venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, co-founder of Andreessen Horowitz, assigned to the productivity and jobs panel; Doug McMillon, former chief executive of Walmart, also on the data group; Greg Mankiw, a Harvard economist and former chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, on the inflation frameworks panel; and former Bank of England Governor Mervyn King, assigned to communications.

According to a Federal Reserve press release, the task forces will be co-led by external advisers and supported by Fed staff, operating independently with a mandate to produce findings for the Federal Open Market Committee.

Warsh said in a statement that the task forces would help sharpen the institution's performance. The Fed's press release quoted him saying the goal is "to ensure the Fed is best positioned to achieve our objectives in this consequential time."

Warsh first disclosed the task force plan after the FOMC's June 16-17 meeting, his first as chair. According to CNBC's reporting on that announcement, the reviews amount to a comprehensive examination of all areas that define modern monetary policy, with no recent chair having launched a project of comparable scope.

American Banker reported that the task forces are expected to deliver policy recommendations to the Fed by the end of the year. A Fed news release did not specify a formal deadline, CNBC noted.

Warsh entered the chairmanship having called publicly for what he described as "regime change" at the central bank, citing what he called a credibility gap caused by the Fed's reliance on lagging indicators and government data he considers poorly calibrated. At the ECB Forum in Sintra, Portugal on July 1, Warsh said the Fed would no longer "rely solely on data that we get from government agencies with mismeasurement problems," according to CNBC's reporting from that event.

The task force structure drew measured praise from at least one Fed veteran. Former Vice Chair Roger Ferguson told CNBC that the approach was consistent with how institutional change has historically moved inside the central bank. "All those who've been in the Fed know that the way change operates is through just what he did, which is create task forces to build consensus," Ferguson said.

Not everyone sees the appointments as straightforward. The inclusion of Andreessen, a political megadonor who backed the Trump administration, drew notice from observers who flagged potential conflicts. American Banker reported the appointment and identified Andreessen as a venture capitalist and political megadonor.

The Fed's balance sheet, currently at roughly $6.7 trillion according to Bloomberg's reporting on the announcement, is one of the specific areas under review. The inflation frameworks panel will also revisit how the Fed understands price drivers, a question carrying practical weight as PCE inflation ran at 3.5 percent over the year through March 2026, well above the Fed's 2 percent target, according to Treasury Department data published in a quarterly economic policy statement.

The FOMC's next scheduled policy meeting falls later this month. Warsh declined to signal a rate decision at the Sintra forum, saying only that inflation remains too high.

Sources cited:
- Federal Reserve press release, July 9, 2026 (https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/pressreleases/monetary20260709a.htm)
- CNBC, Warsh names task force members (https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/09/kevin-warsh-names-members-of-his-federal-reserve-task-forces-including-marc-andreessen-doug-mcmillon.html)
- CNBC, How Warsh has set out to remake the Fed (https://www.cnbc.com/2026/06/21/how-kevin-warsh-has-set-out-to-remake-the-fed.html)
- CNBC, Warsh at ECB Forum, Sintra (https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/01/warsh-faces-multiple-alternative-inflation-signs-as-fed-charts-new-course.html)
- American Banker, Fed task force membership (https://www.americanbanker.com/news/fed-announces-membership-of-monetary-policy-task-forces)
- Bloomberg, Warsh appoints task force leaders (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-07-09/fed-s-warsh-names-leadership-for-five-new-task-forces)
- U.S. Treasury, Economic Policy Statements to TBAC, Q2 2026 (https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/sb0486)