John C. Williams

John C. Williams became the eleventh president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York on June 18, 2018. He also serves as the vice chairman and a permanent member of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC).

Williams is a native of Sacramento, California. He received a bachelor’s degree with high distinction in economics from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1984. He then earned a master’s degree with distinction in economics from the London School of Economics in 1989.

In 1994, following the completion of a doctorate in economics at Stanford University, Williams began his career as an economist at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. In 1998, he was promoted to senior economist and left the Federal Reserve System from 1999 to 2000 to serve as a senior economist at the White House Council of Economic Advisors.

Williams remained at the Board of Governors until he joined the San Francisco Fed in 2002 as a research advisor. He was named senior vice president and advisor in Economic Research in 2004, and then was promoted to executive vice president and research director in 2009. Williams was appointed president of the San Francisco Fed in 2011 and led the Bank until 2018.

Throughout his professional career, Williams has contributed to leading research journals. His research interests include monetary policy under uncertainty and imperfect information; learning; research and development; innovation; productivity; and business cycles. He has collaborated with economists domestically and globally to examine economic and policy issues from different perspectives.

Williams served as associate editor of the Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control from 2001 to 2005, associate editor of the American Economic Review from 2005 to 2008, and managing editor of the International Journal of Central Banking from 2011 to 2016. He has been a research associate for the Centre of Applied Macroeconomics Analysis since 2008. Williams also served as a lecturer at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business in 2008.

Written by the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. See disclaimer.