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Chair of the Federal Reserve

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The chairman 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 chairman presides at meetings of the Board.[2]

Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Seal of the Board of Governors
Flag of the Federal Reserve System
Incumbent
Jerome Powell
since February 5, 2018
United States Federal Reserve System
StyleMr. Chairman
Member ofBoard of Governors
Open Market Committee
Reports toUnited States Congress
SeatEccles Building
Washington, D.C.
AppointerPresident
with Senate advice and consent
Term lengthFour years, renewable (as Chair)
14 years, non-renewable (as Governor)
Constituting instrumentFederal Reserve Act
FormationAugust 10, 1914; 110 years ago (1914-08-10)
First holderCharles Sumner Hamlin
DeputyVice Chair of the Federal Reserve
SalaryExecutive Schedule, Level I[1]
Websitefederalreserve.gov

The chairman serves a four-year term after being nominated by the president of the United States and confirmed by the United States Senate; the officeholder serves concurrently as a member of the Board of Governors. The chairman may serve multiple terms, pending a new nomination and confirmation at the end of each term; William McChesney Martin (1951-1970) was the longest serving chair, with Alan Greenspan (1987-2006) a close second. The president may not have the legal authority to dismiss a chairman before the end of a term, although this assumption has never been tested in court.[3]

The current chairman is Jerome Powell, who was sworn in on February 5, 2018.[4][5] He was nominated to the position by President Donald Trump on November 2, 2017,[6] and later confirmed by the Senate. He was subsequently nominated to a second term by President Joe Biden, later confirmed by the Senate and sworn in on May 23, 2022.[7][8]

Appointment process

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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.[2][9][10][11] The Senate Committee responsible for vetting a Federal Reserve chair nominee is the Senate Committee on Banking.

Duties of the Fed chairman

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By law, at meetings of the Board the chairman shall preside, and, in his absence, the vice chairman shall preside. In the absence of the chairman and the vice chairman, the Board shall elect a member to act as chairman pro tempore.[12]

Under the chairman'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.[13]

By custom, one of the chairman's most important duties is to serve as the chair of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), which is critical in setting short-term U.S. monetary policy. However, the chair of the FOMC is elected at the first meeting of each year, and while the chair of the Board of Governors has always been chosen there is no legal obligation for this to be the case.[14]

By law, the chairman reports twice a year to Congress on the Federal Reserve's monetary policy objectives. He or she 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.[15]

Conflict of interest law

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The law applicable to the chair and all other members of the board provides (in part):

No member of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System shall be an officer or director of any bank, banking institution, trust company, or Federal Reserve bank or hold stock in any bank, banking institution, or trust company; and before entering upon his duties as a member of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System he shall certify under oath that he has complied with this requirement, and such certification shall be filed with the secretary of the Board.[16]

Salary

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Chair of the Federal Reserve is a Level I position in the Executive Schedule,[1] thus earning the salary prescribed for that level (US$246,400, as of April 2024).[17]

List of Fed chairs

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The following is a list of past and present chairs of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. A chair serves for a four-year term after appointment, but may be reappointed for several consecutive four-year terms. Since the Federal Reserve was established in 1914, the following people have served as chair.[a][18]

# Portrait Name
(birth–death) 		Term of office[b] Tenure length Appointed by[c]
Start of term End of term
-   William Gibbs McAdoo
(1863–1941) 		December 23, 1913 August 10, 1914 230 days ex officio[d]
1   Charles Hamlin
(1861–1938) 		August 10, 1914 August 9, 1916 1 year, 365 days Woodrow Wilson
2   William Harding
(1864–1930) 		August 10, 1916 August 9, 1922 5 years, 364 days
3   Daniel Crissinger
(1860–1942) 		May 1, 1923 September 15, 1927 4 years, 137 days Warren G. Harding
4   Roy Young
(1882–1960) 		October 4, 1927 August 31, 1930 2 years, 331 days Calvin Coolidge
5   Eugene Meyer
(1875–1959) 		September 16, 1930 May 10, 1933 2 years, 236 days Herbert Hoover
6   Eugene Black
(1873–1934) 		May 19, 1933 August 15, 1934 1 year, 88 days Franklin D. Roosevelt
7   Marriner Eccles
(1890–1977) 		November 15, 1934 January 31, 1948[e] 13 years, 77 days
8   Thomas McCabe
(1893–1982) 		April 15, 1948 March 31, 1951 2 years, 350 days Harry S. Truman
9   Bill Martin
(1906–1998) 		April 2, 1951 January 31, 1970 18 years, 304 days Harry S. Truman
Dwight D. Eisenhower
John F. Kennedy
Lyndon B. Johnson
10   Arthur Burns
(1904–1987) 		February 1, 1970 January 31, 1978[f] 7 years, 364 days Richard Nixon
11   William Miller
(1925–2006) 		March 8, 1978 August 6, 1979 1 year, 151 days Jimmy Carter
12   Paul Volcker
(1927–2019) 		August 6, 1979 August 11, 1987 8 years, 5 days Jimmy Carter
Ronald Reagan
13   Alan Greenspan
(born 1926) 		August 11, 1987[g] January 31, 2006 18 years, 173 days Ronald Reagan
George H. W. Bush
Bill Clinton
George W. Bush
14   Ben Bernanke
(born 1953) 		February 1, 2006 January 31, 2014 7 years, 364 days George W. Bush
Barack Obama
15   Janet Yellen
(born 1946) 		February 3, 2014 February 3, 2018 4 years, 0 days Barack Obama
16   Jay Powell
(born 1953) 		February 5, 2018[h] Incumbent 6 years, 290 days Donald Trump
Joe Biden

See also

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Notes

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  1. ^ The position was established as Governor of the Federal Reserve Board on December 23, 1913; thereafter became Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System on August 23, 1935; and re-aligned to be gender-neutral after Yellen became the first female officeholder on February 3, 2014.
  2. ^ The start date given here for each officeholder is the day they took the oath of office, and the end date is the day of their term expiration, resignation, or retirement.
  3. ^ A fixed term with reappointment for the Chair, then known as Governor, was not added to the Federal Reserve Act until the Banking Act of 1935 (P.L. 74-305, 49 Stat. 684).
  4. ^ Upon enactment of the Federal Reserve Act on December 23, 1913, the United States secretary of the treasury became ex officio chairman of the Federal Reserve Board and a member of the Reserve Bank Organization Committee (RBOC); all appointed officeholders, from William Gibbs McAdoo to Henry Morgenthau Jr., concurrently served in the position until the Banking Act of 1935 was signed into law on Aug. 23, 1935, which became effective on Feb. 1, 1936. That legislation ceased ex-officio membership, and the active executive officer (previously called the governor of the Federal Reserve Board) became the chairman of the Board of Governors. For purposes of this list, the governor has been perceived as the head of the Federal Reserve System since the establishment of that position on August 10, 1914, because the treasury secretary is a political appointee who can be dismissed by the president of the United States at any time, whereas the Federal Reserve has been created as an independent government agency.
  5. ^ Served as chairman pro tempore from February 3 to April 15, 1948.
  6. ^ Served as chairman pro tempore from February 1 to March 8, 1978.
  7. ^ Served as chairman pro tempore from March 3 to June 20, 1996, while awaiting confirmation by the United States Senate for his third term as chairman.
  8. ^ Served as chair pro tempore from February 5 to May 23, 2022, while awaiting confirmation by the United States Senate for his second term as chair.

References

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  1. ^ a b 5 U.S.C. § 5312
  2. ^ a b see 12 U.S.C. § 242
  3. ^ "Can the President Fire the Chairman of the Federal Reserve?". Cumberland Advisors. Archived from the original on July 27, 2020. Retrieved August 26, 2019.
  4. ^ "Jerome H. Powell sworn in as Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System". Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. Archived from the original on February 6, 2018. Retrieved February 5, 2018.
  5. ^ Cox, Jeff (February 5, 2018). "Jerome Powell takes the reins at the Fed amid market sell-off, jump in yields". CNBC. Archived from the original on February 5, 2018. Retrieved February 6, 2022.
  6. ^ Gensler, Lauren (November 2, 2017). "Trump Taps Jerome Powell As Next Fed Chair In Call For Continuity". Forbes. Archived from the original on November 2, 2017. Retrieved November 3, 2017.
  7. ^ "Jerome H. Powell sworn in for second term as Chair of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System". Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. Archived from the original on May 23, 2022. Retrieved May 23, 2022.
  8. ^ "Powell sworn in to second four-year term as U.S. Fed chief". Reuters. May 23, 2022. Archived from the original on September 2, 2022. Retrieved May 24, 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  9. ^ "The Fed - Board Members". Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. February 21, 2018. Archived from the original on March 18, 2018. Retrieved June 1, 2018.
  10. ^ "The Structure of the Federal Reserve System". Federalreserve.gov. Archived from the original on April 23, 2015. Retrieved April 24, 2015.
  11. ^ Federal Reserve (January 16, 2009). "Board of Governors FAQ". Federal Reserve. Archived from the original on January 17, 2009. Retrieved January 16, 2009.
  12. ^ see 12 U.S.C. § 244
  13. ^ "The Structure and Functions of the Federal Reserve System". www.federalreserveeducation.org. February 21, 2019. Archived from the original on November 13, 2019. Retrieved June 1, 2018.
  14. ^ see FOMC Rules of Organisation at https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/rules_authorizations.htm
  15. ^ "Chair of the Federal Reserve Board". www.stlouisfed.org. February 12, 2019. Archived from the original on June 16, 2018. Retrieved June 12, 2018.
  16. ^ 12 U.S.C. § 244
  17. ^ "Rates of Basic Pay for the Executive Schedule" (PDF). OPM. January 1, 2022. Archived (PDF) from the original on May 8, 2022. Retrieved January 2, 2022.
  18. ^ "Chairs". Membership of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, 1914–present. The Federal Reserve Board. February 5, 2018. Archived from the original on February 12, 2022. Retrieved February 6, 2018.

Further reading

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Scholia has a profile for Chair of the Federal Reserve (Q2666591).
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