Last week Janet Yellen
was confirmed as the next head of the US Federal Reserve. The move is no
surprise as Yellen has long been known to be taking over from Bernanke. Yellen’s
idealogy seems to tie in pretty closely with that of Bernanke and I wouldn’t
expect any sudden change of policy. The FED will likely continue to wind down
its stimulus as the US economy recovers with Yellen at the head. This
appointment isn’t a controversial one and it isn’t a surprise, but it still is
big news because Yellen is a woman.
It is hard to
overstate the importance that carries. Christine LeGarde is head of the IMF,
Merkel chancellor of Germany, so women are represented in what would be
considered economic positions of power in the world, but not that often. At
the University of Chicago, a well respect economics program, women represent 4
of the 35 faculty in the Economics department. Not exactly an even spread.
I teach IB economics
and would assume that most students take the class first for interest, but
second to fill a requirement they will need in university. I find that while about half of my classes
are girls when we talk about university plans the ratio of those going into
economics related fields tilts heavily towards males. Why is this so?
