Strain graduated from Rockhurst High School in Kansas City, Missouri, before attending Marquette University and graduating magna cum laude. Strain holds an M.A. from New York University and a Ph.D. in economics from Cornell University. In 2005, he joined the Federal Reserve Bank of New York as an assistant economist and worked there for the next two years, when he left to join the Center for Economic Studies at the US Census Bureau in 2008. While still working at the US Census Bureau, he took up the job of administrator at the New York Census Research Data Centers in 2011. In 2012, leaving his job at the Census Bureau, Strain joined the American Enterprise Institute as a Research Fellow and later became the Deputy Director of Economic Policy Studies at the institute in 2015. At the AEI, he leads the work of the institute in the economic policy, poverty studies, and health care policy. He is the editor of The US Labor Market: Questions and Challenges for Public Policy He co-edited, with Stan Veuger, the Economic Freedom and Human Flourishing: Perspectives from Political Philosophy. Strain has published articles in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Weekly Standard. Strain has published academic research on gender pay gap, the effects of minimum wage laws, the Affordable Care Act, and payday lending. He has published policy research on increasing employment, the "socially optimal" top marginal income tax rate, worksharing unemployment insurance programs, the effects of job loss, and the federal budget. In 2013, National Review's Reihan Salam described him as the "most important conservative reformer, and the one who could have the biggest beneficial impact on the well-being of Americans struggling to climb the economic ladder." He was featured in a 2014 New York Times Magazinecover story as one of the main intellectuals in the reform conservative movement. He contributed a chapter to Room to Grow: Conservative Reforms for a Limited Government and a Thriving Middle Class, a reform conservative manifesto that New York Times columnist David Brooks called "the most coherent and compelling policy agenda the American right has produced this century." He was identified by Karl Rove in 2014 as one of the new "conservative reformers." Strain's work on employment, anti-poverty and upward mobility issues, and economic opportunity has been featured or profiled in many publications, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Bloomberg View. He is a regular guest on major media outlets, including CNBC, MSNBC, and Marketplace Radio.
Personal life
Strain is Catholic. Strain and his wife have one son.
Selected publications
Books
The US Labor Market: Questions and Challenges for Public Policy.
Economic Freedom and Human Flourishing: Perspectives from Political Philosophy.
