Tom obtained his B.A. and M.A. degrees from the University of Chicago, both on the same day in 1973. He then entered Harvard Law School where he served on the Harvard Law Review Board of Editors. He graduated Magna Cum Laude from Harvard Law in 1976. After law school, Tom served as law clerk to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Byron White. In 1980, Tom returned to the University of Chicago to earn a Ph.D. in Economics. His faculty advisor was Milton Friedman and it was at this time that Tom developed his beliefs in the importance of fiscal responsibility in government and individual liberty.

In 1978, Tom married Susanne, his bride of now 30 years. From 1980-1981, Tom was a White House Fellow in the Office of the Chief of Staff. He then served in the Reagan Administration as Director of the Bureau of Competition, at the Federal Trade Commission from 1981 to 1983.

In 1983, Tom and Susanne moved west when Tom was offered a professorship at Stanford Law School. Tom received full tenure in 1987 at the age of 34. At Stanford, Tom’s classes included antitrust, international trade law, corporate law, and constitutional law, with a particular emphasis on the application of economics to legal problems. At Stanford, Susanne continued her life-long interest in Russia, becoming fluent in Russian, and managing tours to the then Soviet Union. In 1992, Berkeley’s Center for Research in Management hired Susanne to help establish a business school in St. Petersburg, Russia. She was the Executive Director of that program for 16 years.

In 1988, Tom again entered public service. Tom served as a United States Congressman for five terms representing districts in the Silicon Valley. He was also a California State Senator, and the Director of Finance for the State of California. In Congress, Tom served on the Judiciary Committee, the Joint Economic Committee, the Banking and Housing Committee and the International Relations Committee. He has served since 2004 on the Council of Economic Advisors to California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. During Tom’s tenure as State Finance Director, California’s budget was balanced with no tax increases, no new borrowing, and no accounting gimmicks.

Tom has received many accolades for his public service. To name a few, the National Taxpayers Union Foundation named Tom the most frugal member of the 102nd Congress, based on net annualized spending reductions in legislation he proposed. The California Journal named Tom the #1 overall State Senator; the State Senate’s Best Problem-Solver, and the Most Ethical State Senator.

In 2002, Tom was appointed Dean of the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. As Dean of Haas, Tom stressed the importance of corporate social responsibility and business ethics amid an era of corporate scandals. Under Tom’s Deanship, the newly formed Center for Responsible Business took firm root, as well as the Center for Non Profit Management. The Haas School’s rankings shot up in every category and every survey during Tom’s tenure as Dean; most dramatically, reaching the rank of no. 2 in the nation according to the Wall Street Journal in Tom’s last year.

In 2009, Tom and Susanne took a leave of absence to move to Southern California where he joined the Chapman University School of Law in Orange County as the inaugural Presidential Fellow and Visiting Professor of Law. He also serves as an economic advisor to the international law firm of Gibson Dunn & Crutcher.