My appointment to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve in January 2009 came about principally because of my academic work in financial regulation and, to some extent, because of the experience I had as a White House economic policymaker during the Asian Financial Crisis. Although I had picked up some macroeconomics in that and other policymaking jobs over the years, and had worked on labor market issues both in and out of government, I was far from immersed in monetary policy theory or practice. Needless to say, this relative unfamiliarity was a handicap in the early period of my service on the Fed, ... (full story)