Obama Administration's Detroit rescue task force in 2013, which mobilized $300 million to support Detroit. Sperling also led the design and implementation of the president's initiatives on supporting workers facing long-term unemployment, Manufacturing Innovation Hubs, SelectUSA, the College Opportunity Summit, and the ConnectED initiative. According to Robert Greenstein, president of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, "If you look at key budget legislation – in 1993, 1997, 2009, 2010 or 2012 – there is no administration official who did more over the past 20 years to dramatically expand tax credits for low-income workers, with the result that these credits now lift 10 million people out of poverty." Sperling was named one of the 100 Most Powerful People in Finance worldwide in 2013 by Worth Magazine. He was named one of the 50 Most Powerful People in Washington by GQ in 2012. Sperling left the National Economic Council in March 2014. Two years after Sperling left the White House, a ProPublica article reported that he had taken loans totaling between $300,000 and $600,000 from Howard Shapiro, a lawyer at Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr, between 2011 and 2013. Shapiro has been Sperling's closest friend since they were housemates at Yale Law School in 1983. Sperling stated that when his savings were depleted, he "took personal loans from my very closest friend of more than 30 years so that I could afford to remain in public service without having to sell our house when we had only two more years left with both of our children at home." His house in Washington, D.C. was valued at "around $2 million." A White House spokesperson said that every loan had been "reviewed and cleared by White House Counsel and the Office of Government Ethics" and that "no issue came before Sperling that prompted him to recuse himself." Kenneth Gross, a partner at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom who specializes in federal gift and gratuity rules, stated that the fact that the loans were disclosed and cleared by the ethics office "takes the guy off the hook. What more is he supposed to do?" The ProPublica article stated that Sperling "played a role" in a federal and state government settlement with five major financial institutions over foreclosure and mortgage servicing abuses, and that WilmerHale was "one of many law firms involved in negotiating the settlement," though it did not state that Shapiro