Larry Summers, glavni ekonomski svetovalec predsednika Obame, je včeraj predsedniku poslal pismo, da umika svoje ime iz liste kandidatov za predsednika Fed. Kot sem že nekajkrat pisal, je bil Summers kot favorit Obame tarča mnogih medijskih spopadov, ki so problematizirali bodisi njegovo vlogo pred finančno krizo, bodisi njegovo pomanjkljivo poznavanje delovanja monetarne ekonomije, bodisi njegov kontroverzni karakter.

Zdaj se zdi pot na čelo Fed sedanji podpredsednici Fed Janet Yellen odprta. Toda ni nujno. Kot špekuira Ezra Klein v Washington Postu, bi se utegnil Obama odločiti za koga drugega. Če že ne zaradi česa drugega, pa zaradi tega, od ne izgleda kot kapitulacija Bele hiše pred medijskim pritiskom.

Tule je 5 razlogov, zakaj naj bi Obama vseeno imenoval Yellenovo:

1) She’d be the most qualified Federal Reserve chair in memory. Ben Bernanke had three years on the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors when he was named chairman. Paul Volcker had four years leading the New York Federal Reserve before he got the call. Alan Greenspan had never worked at the Fed at all.

2) She got the big calls right. The Fed’s job, put simply, is to predict the path of the economy and put in place the right policies to keep employment high and inflation low. In 2006 and 2007 — and frankly, in 2010 and 2011 — the Fed got that basic job of prediction wrong. It didn’t see the financial crisis coming, and it didn’t see the slow recovery.

3) We still need someone who cares — and cares a lot — about unemployment. According to the best data we have, the economy added 169,000 jobs in August — which if sustained would mean we’ll close the jobs gap sometime in 2023. We also learned that we’d added 74,000 fewer jobs than we thought in June and July. The share of adults who are in the labor force is also at a scary low.

4) She’s a consensus pick — at least outside the White House. This Fed process has been a debacle. The Obama White House has let Summers and Yellen twist in the wind for months now. For various reasons, the race has rattled Wall Street, alienated key parts of the monetary policy community, and infuriated many congressional Democrats — along with other key White House allies, like labor.

5) It’s time to shatter the glass ceiling.

One consequence that has been on sharp display during this process is that because everyone who has ever served in these positions has been male, people end up with a lot of stereotypically male qualities in their assumptions of what it takes to effectively run these organizations. The idea that anyone with Janet Yellen’s resume would ever be accused of lacking “gravitas” is risible — and it would never happen if the person with Janet Yellen’s resume looked like Paul Volcker.

Velja seveda standarden disclaimer, da ni nujno, da se s tem stališčem Ezre Kleina tudi jaz strinjam. Čeprav menim, da bo Yellenova že zaradi svoje zgodovine in manjše kontroverznosti lažje opravljala svoje delo kot pa bi ga Summers. Ni pa nujno, da bo res dobra šefica Fed in da bo res imela srečno roko s krmarjenjem ameriške monetarne politike. Biti druga najpomembnejša oseba v ZDA je hud izziv in težka preizkušnja. Alan Greenspan je vse zapravil s svojim ideološkim prepričanjem, da so finančni trgi učinkoviti in da lahko sami sebe uravnavajo še najbolj učinkovito, kar se je seveda izteklo v izjemno ponesrečen osebni fiasko Greenspana ter največjo gospodarsko krizo v zadnjih osemdesetih letih.