The U.S. Senate is expected to take up the nomination of Janet Yellen as the next Chairman of the Federal Reserve in early January 2014 after the Senate Banking Committee earlier this month decided to recommend approval of her nomination. If confirmed by the Senate she will be the first women to hold the coveted and influential position. She is the current vice chair of the Federal Reserve, a much respected economist and comes with more than 20 years of experience as a U.S. central bank insider. She started working for the Feds in 1977 as an economist.
She is expected to continue the outgoing Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke’s monitory policies. This includes Federal Reserve’s mortgage and bond buying programs and keeping short-term interest rate near zero. The other Federal mandates, keeping unemployment rate low and inflation under control, will also be a major concern for her. Many believe that her approach to employment may differ from that of Mr. Bernanke. She is intimately familiar with job losses within last several years and recently she declared that she and her colleagues are committed to continue to work on job creation and economic growth.