Janet Yellen

Janet Louise Yellen (born August 13, 1946) is an American economist who served as the 78th United States secretary of the treasury from 2021 to 2025 and as chair of the Federal Reserve from 2014 to 2018. She was the first woman to hold either position, and has also led the White House Council of Economic Advisers. Yellen is the Eugene E. and Catherine M. Trefethen Professor of Business Administration and Economics at the University of California, Berkeley.

Born and raised in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, Yellen graduated from Brown University in 1967 and earned a Ph.D. in economics from Yale University in 1971. She taught as an assistant professor at Harvard University from 1971 to 1976, was a staff economist for the Federal Reserve Board from 1977 to 1978, and was a faculty member at the London School of Economics from 1978 to 1980. Yellen is professor emeritus at the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley, where she has been a faculty member since 1980 and became the Eugene E. and Catherine M. Trefethen Professor of Business Administration and Professor of Economics.