Helping Ordinary Americans Focus Of Fed Under Janet Yellen

Janet Yellen on the cover of <em>Time</em> magazine

Janet Yellen will be the first woman to head the the Federal Reserve when she takes over for Ben Bernanke at the end of January. This week on Money Talking, WNYC contributors Joe Nocera with the New York Times and Rana Foroohar with Time magazine discuss the woman who will soon steer the world's largest economy. Foroohar sat down with Yellen for an exclusive interview this week and says that she will focus on the kitchen-table economy: how to help ordinary families get back on their feet. Nocera says Yellen may turn out to be the right Fed chairman at the right time: Just as Bernanke — an expert on the causes of the Great Depression — came and battled the Great Recession, Yellen is an expert on unemployment who will apply her skills to the nation's stubborn unemployment problem.