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Three weeks after the global financial community confronted the second largest bank run in American history, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen GRD ’71 will speak at the School of Management on the Biden administration’s economic agenda. 

On Apr. 3, President Peter Salovey will host a discussion with Yellen on modern supply side economics at the School of Management at 2 p.m. Salovey and Yellen will discuss the federal government’s work to “increase labor supply, raise productivity, reduce inequality and environmental damage” in the context of the research of the Tobin Center which is sponsoring the event. 

 “By convening leaders such as Secretary Yellen and working collaboratively with faculty members across the university,” Salovey said, “the Tobin Center is helping to set the national agenda and informing domestic public policy through evidence-based research.”

Yellen graduated from Yale with a degree in Economics in 1971. Prior to serving as Treasury Secretary, Yellen served as President Bill Clinton’s Chair of Economic Advisor, and as the Chair of the Federal Reserve under President Barack Obama. 

Modern supply-side economics, in Yellen’s words, aims “to boost economic growth by increasing labor supply, raising productivity, and reducing inequality and environmental damage.” The federal government’s economic agenda, which is rooted in modern supply-side principles, has won bipartisan support for its role in driving recent legislative victories, like the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and CHIPS Act. 

Yellen’s work came into the national spotlight earlier this month when regulators closed the Silicon Valley Bank and the Signature Bank in the second and third largest bank failures in U.S. history. 

Yellen promised that those responsible for the collapse would “be held fully accountable.” 

In the immediate aftermath of the bank blowup, Yellen and top economic advisor Lael Brainard worked with regulators to provide a deposit guarantee for households and businesses impacted by the failures. No taxpayer money has been used to finance the initiative.

The event will situate the economic discussion in the context of research and policy work at the Tobin Center, which serves as a platform for data-driven research to inform national, non-partisan policy work.

The Tobin Center was established in 2018 and is the third research center within the Economics Department, alongside the Economic Growth Center and the Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Tobin Center was at the forefront of the economic research that informed state and federal policies aimed at curbing the recession.

According to Rebecca Toseland, senior lecturer in economics and Tobin Director of Research Support, the Tobin Center has also worked to increase diversity in economic research inspired by Yellen. 

“Inspired by people like Secretary Yellen who led the way, a central and founding element of the Tobin Center’s mission is to increase the diversity of researchers and voices in the economics field,” Toseland told the News. “Our Predoc Program is the embodiment of this mission at Tobin. Across four years of recruitment, the program has onboarded over 100 predocs who have supported 60+ faculty members.”

During the event, Yellen will also call on academic economists and students to “deploy their talents” on issues related to modern supply side economics

Tickets for the event will go on sale this weekend, with many students looking forward to picking one up. 

“I’m excited for Secretary Yellen’s visit,” Alex Bavalsky ’25 told the News. “I hope she will address the applications of her supply side policy to the ongoing challenges of the US economy, including high inflation and the rapidly growing national debt.”

Yellen was confirmed by the Senate on Jan. 26, 2022.