The chair of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System is the head of the Federal Reserve, and is the active executive officer of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. The chair presides at meetings of the Board.
Appointment process
thumb|Federal Reserve chairs (left to right): [[Janet Yellen, Alan Greenspan, Ben Bernanke, and Paul Volcker. Photo taken 1 May 2014, when Yellen was chair.]]
As stipulated by the Banking Act of 1935, the chairman is chosen by the president from among the sitting governors to serve four-year terms with the advice and consent of the Senate. The Senate Committee responsible for vetting a Federal Reserve chair nominee is the Senate Committee on Banking.
Duties of the chair
By law, at meetings of the board the chair presides, or in the absence of the chair, the vice chair presides. In the absence of the chair and the vice chair, the board elects a member to act as chair pro tempore.
Under the chair's leadership, the Board's responsibilities include analysis of domestic and international financial and economic developments. The board also supervises and regulates the Federal Reserve Banks, exercises responsibility in the nation's payments system, and administers consumer credit protection laws.
By custom, the chair also chairs the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), which directs short-term U.S. monetary policy. Although the statute and rules of the FOMC allow it to elect any member as its chair, it has always chosen the chair of the Board in practice.
By law, the chair reports twice a year to Congress on the Federal Reserve's monetary policy objectives. The chair of the Federal Reserve also testifies before Congress on numerous other financial issues and meets periodically with the treasury secretary, who is a member of the president's Cabinet.
Conflict of interest law
The law applicable to the chair and all other members of the board provides (in part):
Salary
The chair of the Federal Reserve is a Level I position in the Executive Schedule,
List of Fed chairs
Following the enactment of the Federal Reserve Act on December 23, 1913, the United States secretary of the treasury, William Gibbs McAdoo became responsible for overseeing of the establishment of the Federal Reserve system. He became the ex officio chairman of the Federal Reserve Board and a member of the Reserve Bank Organization Committee (RBOC). Until the Banking Act of 1935 was signed into law on Aug. 23, 1935 and became effective on Feb. 1, 1936, the incumbent treasury secretary had also been the ex officio Fed chair, whilst the de facto active head of the central bank was known as the governor of the Federal Reserve Board. The 1935 Act ended ex-officio membership of the treasury secretary, re-designating the governor as the chairman of the Board of Governors.
Since Alan Greenspan's term beginning in 1987, Fed chairs have largely been economists with a doctorate in economics, with the exception of Jerome Powell, who had been a lawyer and investment banker before the start of his term. Arthur Burns had been the first Fed chair to have a PhD in economics, although his two successors prior to Greenspan did not. Some economists have argued that a Fed chair ought to have a PhD in economics.
The following is a list of the past and present chairs of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System as well as governors of the Federal Reserve Board prior to the 1935 Act taking effect. A chair serves for a four-year term after appointment, but may be reappointed for several further four-year terms. Since the Federal Reserve was established in 1914, the following people have served as chair.
{|class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center"
|-
!rowspan=2 |
!colspan=2 rowspan=2 |Name<br>
!colspan=2 |Term
!rowspan=2 |Duration
!rowspan=2 |Appointer<!--This list includes only the president who nominated or reappointed the Federal Reserve chairman, contrary to all presidents under whom the chairman served during his or her term of office. -->
!rowspan=2 |Experience
!rowspan=2 |Education
|-
!Start
!End
|-
!–
|90px
|<br>
|December 23, 1913
|August 10, 1914
|data-sort-value="0 years, 230 days" |
|ex officio
|Lawyer<br>Secretary of the Treasury
|University of Tennessee (BA)
|-
!1
|90px
|<br>
|August 10, 1914
|August 9, 1916
|
|rowspan="2" style="font-weight:normal" |Woodrow Wilson
|Lawyer<br>Assistant Secretary of the Treasury
|Harvard University (BA, MA)
|-
!2
|90px
|<br>
|August 10, 1916
|August 9, 1922
|
|Banker<br>Member of the Federal Reserve Board
|University of Alabama (BA, MA)
|-
!3
|90px
|<br>
|May 1, 1923
|September 15, 1927
|
|Warren G. Harding
|Lawyer<br>Comptroller of the Currency
|University of Akron (BS)<br>University of Cincinnati (LLB)
|-
!4
|90px
|<br>
|October 4, 1927
|August 31, 1930
|
|Calvin Coolidge
|Banker<br>President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis
|
|-
!5
|90px
|<br>
|September 16, 1930
|May 10, 1933
|
|Herbert Hoover
|Financier
|Yale University (BA)
|-
!6
|90px
|<br>
|May 19, 1933
|August 15, 1934
|
|rowspan=2 style="font-weight:normal" |Franklin D. Roosevelt
|Lawyer<br>President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta
|University of Georgia (BA)<br>Atlanta Law School (LLB)
|-
!7
|90px
|<br>
|November 15, 1934
|January 31, 1948
|
|Banker
|
|-
!8
|90px
|<br>
|April 15, 1948
|March 31, 1951
|
|Harry S. Truman
|Business executive
|Swarthmore College (BA)
|-
!9
|90px
|<br>
|April 2, 1951
|January 31, 1970
|
|Harry S. Truman<br>Dwight D. Eisenhower<br>John F. Kennedy<br>Lyndon B. Johnson
|Financier<br>President of the New York Stock Exchange
|Yale University (BA)<br>Columbia University (attended)
|-
!10
|90px
|<br>
|February 1, 1970
|January 31, 1978
|
|Richard Nixon<br>Gerald Ford
|Economist<br>Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers<br>Counselor to the President
|Columbia University (BA, MA, PhD)
|-
!11
|90px
|<br>
|March 8, 1978
|August 6, 1979
|
|Jimmy Carter
|Lawyer, investment banker, business executive
|Amarillo College (attended)<br>United States Coast Guard Academy (BS)<br>University of California, Berkeley (LLB)
|-
!12
|90px
|<br>
|August 6, 1979
|August 11, 1987
|
|Jimmy Carter<br>Ronald Reagan
|Economist<br>President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York
|Princeton University (BA)<br>Harvard University (MA)<br>London School of Economics (attended)
|-
!13
|90px
|<br>
|August 11, 1987
|January 31, 2006
|
|Ronald Reagan<br>George H. W. Bush<br>Bill Clinton<br>George W. Bush
|Economist<br>Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers
|New York University (BA, MA, PhD)<br>Columbia University (attended)
|-
!14
|90px
|<br>
|February 1, 2006
|January 31, 2014
|
|George W. Bush<br>Barack Obama
|Economist<br>Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers
|Harvard University (BA, MA)<br>Massachusetts Institute of Technology (PhD)
|-
!15
|90px
|<br>
|February 3, 2014
|February 3, 2018
|
|Barack Obama
|Economist<br>Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve<br>President of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco<br>Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers
|Brown University (BA)<br>Yale University (MA, PhD)
|-
!16
|90px
|<br>
|February 5, 2018
|May 22, 2026
|
|Donald Trump<br>Joe Biden
|Lawyer and investment banker<br>Under Secretary of the Treasury for Domestic Finance<br>Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Financial Institutions
|Princeton University (BA)<br>Georgetown University (JD)
|-
!17
|120x120px
|Kevin Warsh<br>
|May 22, 2026
|Incumbent
|
|Donald Trump
|Investment banker and financier<br>Member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors
|Stanford University (BA)<br>Harvard University (JD)
|}
See also
- Federal Reserve Board of Governors
- History of central banking in the United States
Notes
References
Further reading
- Beckhart, Benjamin Haggott. 1972. Federal Reserve System. [New York]: American Institute of Banking.
- Shull, Bernard. 2005. The fourth branch: the Federal Reserve's unlikely rise to power and influence. Westport, Conn.: Praeger.
External links
- Public Statements of the Chairs of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, via the St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank
- Nomination hearings, conducted in the Senate, for Chairs and Members of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
- Timeline of Federal Reserve Chairs with related resources