WASHINGTON, D.C. – Janet Yellen, distinguished fellow in residence in the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy at the Brookings Institution, has been selected by President-Elect Joe Biden to become his nominee for Secretary of the Treasury.
Yellen joined Brookings in 2018 after a four-year term as chair of the Federal Reserve Board. At Brookings, she has been providing expertise and commentary on a range of economic issues, including financial stability, climate change, fiscal and monetary responses to the COVID-19 recession, inflation, unemployment, and diversity in economics. She offered her perspective and analysis at Brookings panels, testimony before Congress, lectures across the United States and abroad, and regularly served as a commentator in the media.
“We have benefited greatly from Janet Yellen’s perspective and wisdom at Brookings’ Hutchins Center for the past three years,” said Brookings President John R. Allen. “She has been an inspiration to so many—especially to young women who aspire to careers in economic and public service. We appreciate, and truly respect, her willingness to return to public service at this critical moment in our nation’s history. We wish her our very best!”
Yellen is currently Professor Emerita at the University of California at Berkeley and a distinguished fellow and current president of the American Economic Association. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Economic Strategy Group of the Aspen Institute, the Group of Thirty, and the Climate Leadership Council (for which she was a founding member). She serves on the advisory boards of the Bloomberg New Economic Forum, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget and Fix the Debt Coalition, and the Washington Center for Equitable Growth Steering Committee. She served as an alumni fellow of the Yale Corporation from 2000 to 2006.
“Janet Yellen has been at the forefront of economic policy making for decades, working tirelessly to promote broad-based economic prosperity and a sound financial system,” said Vice President and Director of Economic Studies Stephanie Aaronson. “Her experience will be invaluable in tackling the economic challenges that we are facing as a nation.”
Yellen previously served as Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve Board from 2010 to 2014, as President and Chief Executive Officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco from 2004 to 2010, and as Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers during the Clinton administration. She has been a faculty member at the University of California at Berkeley since 1980. Prior to Berkeley, she was assistant professor of economics at Harvard University (1971-1976), an economist at the Federal Reserve Board (1977-1978), and a lecturer at the London School of Economics (1978-1988).
The Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy in the Economic Studies program at Brookings was created in 2014 to improve the quality of fiscal and monetary policy and public understanding of it.