Peter Orszag is the CEO and chairman of Lazard, the American economist who ran the federal budget under President Barack Obama.
Most budget chiefs fade from view once they leave Washington. He did the opposite, moving to Wall Street and climbing to the very top.
So how did a policy nerd from Boston end up running a global finance firm? Here is his full story, career, family and fortune.
Quick Answer
Peter Orszag, Lazard CEO and chairman and former Obama budget director, has an estimated net worth of about $10 million to $25 million in 2026, built over decades in government, banking and finance.
| Full Name | Peter Richard Orszag |
|---|---|
| Born | December 16, 1968, Boston, Massachusetts, USA |
| Age | 57 years old (turns 58 in December 2026) |
| Occupation | Economist and business executive, CEO and Chairman of Lazard |
| Known For | Directing the Congressional Budget Office and the Office of Management and Budget, then leading Lazard |
| Net Worth | Estimated $10 million to $25 million (2026 estimates) |
| Nationality | American |
Early Life
Peter Richard Orszag was born on December 16, 1968, in Boston, Massachusetts. He grew up nearby in Lexington, a town known for schools and history.
Academics ran in the family. His father, Steven Orszag, was a respected applied mathematician who taught at Yale University for many years.
His mother, Reba Karp Orszag, ran a research and development company. Dinner table talk at home was more likely about ideas than small talk.
His family roots trace back to Hungarian Jewish immigrants who arrived in New York in 1903. That immigrant work ethic clearly stuck around.
He has two brothers, including Jonathan Orszag, who also became an economist. Numbers, it seems, were something of a family trade.
Friends and profiles from his school years describe a driven student. He was not just good at maths, he was genuinely curious about policy.
Education
The Peter Orszag education story starts at Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire. He graduated with high honors from the famous prep school in 1987.
Next came Princeton University, where he studied economics. He finished his degree in 1991, graduating summa cum laude and joining Phi Beta Kappa.
His senior thesis looked at congressional oversight of the Federal Reserve. Even as a student, he was already thinking about how Washington handles money.
Princeton also gave him its top economics prize for a graduating student. It was an early sign that bigger stages were coming.
He then crossed the Atlantic as a Marshall Scholar. At the London School of Economics, he earned a masters degree in 1992.
He stayed at LSE for his doctorate, completing a PhD in economics in 1997. His thesis explored hyperinflation, privatization and sudden economic regime shifts.
That mix of theory and real world policy shaped his whole career. He learned the models, then spent decades testing them in governement.
Career
The Peter Orszag career path is unusual. Very few people lead a congressional agency, join a Cabinet, and then run a global bank.
Early Roles in Washington
His first taste of power came in the Clinton years. He served as a senior economist and adviser on the Council of Economic Advisers.
From 1997 to 1998, he worked as Special Assistant to the President for Economic Policy. He was still in his twenties at the time.
Between government jobs, he joined the Brookings Institution as a senior fellow. There he co-founded and directed The Hamilton Project, a policy initiative.
He also lectured at the University of California, Berkeley, and co-wrote books. Retirement security and Social Security reform became signature topics for him.
Director of the Congressional Budget Office
In January 2007, he became the seventh director of the Congressional Budget Office. The CBO gives Congress independent numbers on budgets and legislation.
He pushed the agency to look harder at health care costs. He argued, again and again, that rising medical spending drove Americas long term deficit.
He also expanded the CBO health team with more analysts. Colleagues credited him with making dry budget reports part of the national conversation.
His CBO run lasted until November 2008. By then, a new president was about to give him a much bigger job.
Director of the Office of Management and Budget
President Barack Obama picked him as his budget director. As Peter Orszag OMB director, he served from January 2009 to July 2010.
He was the 37th person to hold that job. The OMB drafts the federal budget and checks how agencies actually perform.
His timing could hardly have been tougher. He arrived weeks after a financial crash, with jobs vanishing and the deficit exploding.
He helped shape the 2009 stimulus package, known as the Recovery Act. The goal was simple to say and hard to do: rescue the economy.
Health care reform was his other big fight. His cost analysis fed directly into the work that became the Affordable Care Act.
He stepped down in the summer of 2010. After leaving, he wrote columns and became a visiting fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Citigroup Years
In January 2011, he surprised some old colleagues by joining Citigroup. He became a vice chairman of corporate and investment banking there.
He also chaired the banks Financial Strategy and Solutions Group. The role meant advising big clients using lessons learned in Washington.
Critics debated the revolving door between government and banking. Orszag, for his part, kept working and kept a fairly low profile.
Reports from that period put his Citigroup pay in the millions per year. His wealth, modest in government, grew quickly in banking.
Lazard and the Road to CEO
Lazard hired him in May 2016 as vice chairman of investment banking. It proved to be the move that defined his second career.
He later led North American mergers and acquisitions. He also co-led the firms global health care practice, a neat fit for his background.
In April 2019, he became CEO of Lazard Financial Advisory. That put him in charge of advice work for companies and governments worldwide.
The top job followed soon after. Peter Orszag Lazard CEO is the title he took on October 1, 2023, also joining the board.
In January 2025, his role grew again to CEO and chairman. His Lazard 2030 plan aims to double firm revenue by 2030.
He has talked about hiring more senior bankers each year. He also created a geopolitical advisory unit, blending policy know how with deal advice.
Career Highlights and Achievements
His trophy shelf mixes academic honors, policy wins and corporate milestones. Few economists can point to a list quite like this one.
- Graduated summa cum laude from Princeton and earned a PhD from LSE as a Marshall Scholar.
- Directed the Congressional Budget Office from 2007 to 2008, expanding its health care analysis.
- Served as the 37th director of the Office of Management and Budget under President Obama.
- Helped shape the 2009 Recovery Act and the Affordable Care Act.
- Co-founded The Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution.
- Became CEO of Lazard in October 2023 and chairman in January 2025.
He is a member of the National Academy of Medicine. That honor reflects how deeply his work touched American health policy.
He has also sat on respected boards and councils. These include the Peterson Institute for International Economics and Mount Sinai Hospital.
His writing record is long too. Books like Saving Social Security, written with Peter Diamond, kept him in policy debates between jobs.
He later wrote opinion columns for major outlets. Even in banking, he never really stopped being a public policy voice.
Personal Life
The Peter Orszag wife story begins at a Washington party. He met journalist Bianna Golodryga around the 2009 White House Correspondents Dinner.
They married on September 25, 2010. Golodryga is a CNN senior global affairs analyst, known earlier for Good Morning America and financial news.
She was born in Soviet Moldova and came to America as a child refugee. Her own rise in journalism is a story in itself.
The couple have a son and a daughter together. Orszag has five children in total, including children from his first marriage.
His first marriage, to Cameron Hamill, lasted from 1997 to 2006. That chapter ended before his Obama White House years began.
As of 2026, reliable profiles still list Golodryga as his wife. The pair keep family life fairly private despite two public careers.
He is known as a keen runner in his spare time. Colleagues over the years have joked about his energy and early starts.
Net Worth
Peter Orszag net worth figures online vary a lot. The most commonly cited range for 2026 sits between $10 million and $25 million.
Some older profiles simply settle on $25 million. Others give wider ranges, so treat any single exact figure with healthy skepticism.
No official filing lists his total wealth. Unlike his salary, his full mix of assets and investments is not public.
What is public is his Lazard pay. A recent proxy report put his total compensation for fiscal 2025 at about $13.7 million.
That package mixed a $900,000 base salary with bonuses and stock awards. Stock, over time, is where executive wealth really builds.
Before Lazard, Citigroup paid him millions a year too. In 2013 he reportedly earned about $3.1 million, rising toward $4 million in 2014.
Government salaries, by contrast, were modest. His fortune is clearly a private sector story, built after his White House exit.
Books, speaking and columns added smaller streams along the way. Still, banking pay and Lazard equity remain the finanical engine here.
Bottom line: he is a genuinely wealthy executive, not a billionaire. The $10 million to $25 million range fits the known facts best.
Social Media Presence
Do not expect influencer style posting from him. His public presence runs mainly through Lazard, business television and major conferences.
He appears often on financial news channels discussing markets and policy. Clips of those interviews circulate widely on social platforms.
Lazard official channels share his speeches and strategy updates. That corporate feed is the easiest reliable way to follow his work.
His wife is far more visible online than he is. Golodryga posts regularly about news, family life and her CNN work.
For readers, the safest sources are verified company and network accounts. Fan pages and copycat profiles about him should be ignored.
FAQs
How old is Peter Orszag?
Peter Orszag age is 57. He was born on December 16, 1968, in Boston and turns 58 in December 2026.
What is Peter Orszag net worth in 2026?
Estimates for 2026 commonly range from $10 million to $25 million. No official figure exists, so all published numbers are estimates.
Who is Peter Orszag wife?
He is married to Bianna Golodryga, a CNN senior global affairs analyst. They wed in September 2010 and have two children together.
What does Peter Orszag do now?
He is CEO and chairman of Lazard, a global financial advisory and asset management firm. He became CEO in October 2023.
What did Peter Orszag study?
He studied economics at Princeton, graduating summa cum laude in 1991. He later earned a masters and PhD at LSE as a Marshall Scholar.
What government jobs did Peter Orszag hold?
He directed the Congressional Budget Office from 2007 to 2008. He then directed the Office of Management and Budget from 2009 to 2010.
Conclusion
This Peter Orszag biography shows a rare career arc. Academic star, budget referee, Cabinet official, banker, and finally chief executive.
Love or question the revolving door, his influence is hard to deny. He helped steer an economy in crisis, then rebuilt himself on Wall Street.
Now, with Lazard 2030 as his test, the numbers guy faces his biggest scoreboard yet. Markets, as always, will mark the final grade.
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