Mary Daly chosen to lead San Francisco Fed
Mary Daly will be the next president of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, the bank’s board of directors announced late last week. She will start in the new role on October 1.
Daly is a widely respected economist who joined the San Francisco Fed in 1996 as a researcher and climbed the ranks to become director of research. She has focused much of her attention lately on why wages aren’t rising faster despite low unemployment.
“In addition to her profound knowledge of economics and monetary policy, Mary is one of our nation’s leading authorities on labor market dynamics,” said Alex Mehran, chair of the presidential search committee.
Daly is taking over the bank after former president John Williams departed this summer to become president of the New York Fed. She will be only the second woman to lead the San Francisco Fed, the other being Janet Yellen, who was president of the San Francisco bank from 2004 to 2010 before becoming chair of the entire Federal Reserve system. Daly credits Yellen with making “my career kind of explode.”
The Fed has been pushing to diversify its ranks. The search committee for the San Francisco post said it reached out to 283 candidates and that a third were female and a third were minority. Daly is openly gay and has spoken out frequently about the need for more diversity at the Fed and in the economics profession.
“Many thought of the Fed as a ‘boys’ club.’ This perception was deterring talented individuals from applying and undermining our goal of attracting the highest caliber workforce,” Daly wrote in a Medium post two years ago.
Daly worked to change that perception and bring more female research associates to the San Francisco bank. She called university professors and then called every candidate — male and female — when the bank extended an offer in an effort to ensure they understood all the opportunities ahead of them.
The Federal Reserve is made up of seven governors who sit in Washington D.C. and are appointed by the president and confirmed by the U.S. Senate, as well as 12 regional Fed presidents like Daly who are appointed by boards from their areas.