Xudong An

Assistant Vice President, Supervision, Regulation, and Credit, Philadelphia Fed

Xudong (Sean) An is an Assistant Vice President in the Supervision, Regulation, and Credit Department at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, and oversees RMR’s stress testing and retail supervision and research functions. 

Dr. An conducts research in the areas of credit risk, real estate finance, and consumer finance. His research papers have appeared in such academic journals as the Journal of Financial Economics, the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, and Real Estate Economics. Dr. An is one of the leading experts in the modeling of mortgage prepayment and default risks. He has consulted with Fannie Mae, the U.S. Department of the Treasury, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Dr. An is on the editorial boards of Real Estate Economics and the Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics. He serves the academic community as the Second Vice President of the American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association (AREUEA) and has been a member of program committees and award committees of the International Finance and Banking Society (IFABS), the Financial Management Association (FMA), the American Real Estate Society (ARES), and AREUEA.

Before joining the Fed, Dr. An was a tenured professor of finance and the Endowed Professor of Real Estate at San Diego State University. He won an Outstanding Faculty Contribution Award in 2015. He was also a visiting associate professor at the University of California, Los Angeles and a visiting senior research fellow at the National University of Singapore. Dr. An is an elected Fellow of the Weimer School of the Homer Hoyt Institute, and has a Ph.D. from the University of Southern California. 

Janet Boguslaw

Senior Scientist, Heller School and Institute for Economic and Racial Equity

Dr. Janet Boguslaw is a Senior Scientist at the Heller School and Institute for Economic and Racial Equity. She is also a non-resident Research Fellow at the Rutgers School of Labor and Management Relations. Her research focuses on creating multi-sector innovations and partnerships to advance equitable economic opportunity and stability through institutional and public policy-driven initiatives focusing on workforce and economic development, job quality, family financial stability, new structures of work, and gender and asset based inequalities. Participant engagement in research, analysis, and recommendation development is key to all the work. Dr. Boguslaw has worked with corporate managers to research, direct and advance their community development initiatives, with state and not for profit agencies in the areas of workforce training, employment stabilization, family and child well-being, and on funded research exploring issues of regional development, disparities, and wealth building. Most recently at Brandeis she directed a federally funded university/community project examining career advancement and job quality in healthcare. Through Rutgers analyzed primary data on the asset building, life course, and family impacts of employee ownership for low and moderate-income workers, with a focus on its role in reducing gender and racial wealth inequality. She engages as a member of the Closing the Women’s Wealth Gap national initiative; on the Workforce Development Steering Committee on Racial Equity Insight Center for Community Economic Development (Oakland, CA); as Humanities Advisor, The Kitchenistas film project, The Beyster Foundation (La Jolla, CA); and as Board Member and Clerk, Family Nurturing Centers (Boston MA).

Ray Boshara

Senior Advisor, Institute for Economic Equity, St. Louis Fed

Ray Boshara is senior advisor for the Institute for Economic Equity at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, where he focuses on building savings and wealth inclusively. He is also a senior fellow in the Financial Security Program at the Aspen Institute. Before joining the Fed in 2011, Boshara was vice president of New America, a think tank in Washington, D.C. Most recently he led and co-edited the book, “The Future of Building Wealth: Brief Essays on the Best Ideas to Build Wealth—for Everyone” published in Fall 2021 in partnership with the Aspen Institute. Boshara is widely credited with leading the campaign to enact the Assets for Independence Act, which created thousands of Individual Development Accounts throughout the U.S. He also forged Baby Bonds, Roths at Birth, Child Savings Accounts and other measures in the U.S. Congress to establish savings accounts at birth for all kids. Over the past 25 years, he has advised presidential candidates, as well as the George W. Bush, Clinton, Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations. He has testified before the U.S. House and Senate several times. Boshara has written for The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Atlantic and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and has appeared on CBS Sunday Morning, NPR, Bloomberg, and CNBC, among others. His first book, “The Next Progressive Era,” co-authored with Phillip Longman, was published in 2009. Raised in Akron, Ohio, Boshara is a graduate of The Ohio State University, Yale Divinity School and the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard.

Jim Bullard

President & CEO, St. Louis Fed

James (“Jim”) Bullard is the president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. In that role, he is a participant on the Federal Reserve’s Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), which meets regularly to set the direction of U.S. monetary policy. He also oversees the Federal Reserve’s Eighth District, including activities at the St. Louis headquarters and its branches in Little Rock, Ark., Louisville, Ky., and Memphis, Tenn. A noted economist and policymaker, Bullard makes Fed transparency and dialogue a priority on the international and national stage as well as on Main Street. He serves on the board of directors of Concordance Academy of Leadership, and he is a past board chair of the United Way U.S.A. He is an executive committee member of the Greater St. Louis Inc.’s chair’s council. In addition, Bullard is co-editor of the Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, a member of the editorial advisory board of the National Institute Economic Review and a member of the Central Bank Research Association’s senior council. He is an honorary professor of economics at Washington University in St. Louis, where he also sits on the advisory council of the economics department and the advisory board of the Center for Dynamic Economics. A native of Forest Lake, Minn., Bullard received his doctorate in economics from Indiana University in Bloomington.

Sara Chaganti

Deputy Director of Research, Regional and Community Outreach, Boston Fed

Sara Chaganti is the Deputy Director of Research in the Boston Fed’s Regional and Community Outreach department. She conducts applied quantitative and qualitative research to inform public policy. She has expertise in structural racism and racial equity, wealth inequality, and labor market disparities and job quality. She has published in peer-reviewed journals as well as reports and briefs, and has taught at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Sara holds a Ph.D. in social policy and sociology from Brandeis University, a master’s degree in law, policy, and society from Northeastern University, and a bachelor’s degree in anthropology from Yale University.

Prabal Chakrabarti

Executive Vice President, Regional and Community Outreach, Boston Fed

Prabal Chakrabarti is an Executive Vice-President at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston in the Regional and Community Outreach department, with a mission to improve the economic well-being of low- and moderate- income people. He oversees a department that focuses on three main pillars: (1) revitalizing smaller cities and rural areas through the Working Cities Challenge and Working Communities Challenge; (2) improving household financial stability for all, especially by race and ethnicity; and (3) increasing employment opportunities by improving the quality of jobs and enhancing access to quality, affordable child care. 

Previously, Prabal was at the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City, where he led a research effort to measure economic competitiveness in America’s inner cities. He served in the U.S. Treasury in economic policy and he co-wrote a UNDP report Unleashing Entrepreneurship: Making Business Work for the Poor. 

Prabal holds graduate degrees from MIT and Oxford University, where he was a Marshall Scholar, and a B.S. from the University of Illinois, where he was a Truman Scholar. He serves on the boards of the Nellie Mae Education Foundation and the Conservation Law Foundation, and chairs the Marshall Scholar Regional Selection Committee.

Fiona Greig

Managing Director and Co-President, JPMorgan Chase Institute

Fiona Greig is a Managing Director and the Co-President at the JPMorgan Chase Institute, which delivers data-rich analyses and expert insights for the public good. She joined the Institute in 2014 after serving as the Deputy Budget Director for the City of Philadelphia for two years. From 2007 to 2012, Fiona was a consultant for McKinsey & Company where she consulted public and social sector clients on strategy, operations and economic development. In 2009 Fiona started and ran Bank on DC, a financial inclusion program for the District of Columbia. 

Fiona has published research on topics including household finance, healthcare, labor markets and the Online Platform Economy, gender, and behavioral decision making. Her work has been widely cited in the media, including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, NPR, and CNBC. Fiona has held adjunct professor appointments at the University of Pennsylvania and Georgetown University and holds a B.A. from Stanford University and a Ph.D. in Public Policy from Harvard University. 

Ana Hernández Kent

Senior Researcher, Institute for Economic Equity, St. Louis Fed

Ana Hernández Kent is a senior researcher for the Institute for Economic Equity (IEE) at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. She conducts research, performs data analysis and advises on issues of economic equity. Her primary research interests include:

· Examining economic disparities and opportunities through a demographic lens 

· Exploring wealth outcomes and wealth inequality

· Highlighting the role of systemic biases and historical factors in facilitating or blocking wealth accumulation 

Kent received a Ph.D. in experimental psychology with concentrations in social psychology and quantitative methods in behavioral sciences from Saint Louis University (SLU). She earned a master’s degree in experimental psychology from SLU and a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of Notre Dame. 

Her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Bloomberg, The Atlantic, The Financial Times, Daily Mail, The New Yorker and CNN, among other outlets.

Genevieve Melford

Director of Insights and Evidence, Aspen Institute Financial Security Program

As the Director of Insights and Evidence at the Aspen Institute Financial Security Program (FSP), Genevieve Melford leads a team of talented researchers working to develop data-driven and person-centered insights,  knowledge synthesis, and problem solving among a wide cross-section of experts to illuminate and prioritize critical financial security issues and identify solutions that can improve the financial lives of millions of people. 

Prior to joining FSP, Genevieve worked at the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), where she led the Bureau’s work to define, measure, and study the drivers of consumer financial well-being, as well as effectiveness research on financial education and capability strategies. While at the CFPB, she co-chaired the interagency Financial Literacy and Education Commission (FLEC)’s Research and Evaluation Committee.  Before that, she served as Director of Research at Prosperity Now, a national nonprofit dedicated to expanding economic opportunity for low-income families and communities. Genevieve holds an M.P.A. from Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs and a B.A. in economics from Wesleyan University. 

William M. Rodgers III

Vice President and Director, Institute for Economic Equity, St. Louis Fed

William M. Rodgers III is vice president and director of the Institute for Economic Equity at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. Before joining the Fed, Rodgers served as professor of public policy and chief economist at the Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers University. His areas of expertise include compensation, pay equity, diversity and inclusion, labor market and general economic trends. 

Rodgers is an elected member of the National Academy of Social Insurance and served as the Academy’s board chair for the last five years. Rodgers also serves as treasurer for the Institute for Women’s Policy Research. He is a non-resident fellow at The Century Foundation and has served in many public capacities, including on President Obama’s Department of Labor transition team, and as chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor from 2000 to 2001. He served on the National Economic Association Board and is a past president. Rodgers also served on the U.S. Board of United Way Worldwide and currently works on the Board of Trustees of McDaniel College. He served at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta as a visiting scholar and chairs the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine’s expert panel to evaluate the quality of compensation data collected from U.S. employers by the EEOC. 

He has published articles in the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, the Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, the Review of Black Political Economy, and Family Economics and Nutrition Review. His book, The Handbook on the Economics of Discrimination, was selected by Choice, the review journal of the American Library Association, as an Outstanding Academic Book for 2006. 

Rodgers has been called upon for articles in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Fortune Magazine, The Washington Post, The Guardian, The Financial Times and many other publications. He has been a guest on numerous television and radio shows, including MSNBC, Yahoo Finance, CNBC, NPR’s Marketplace, Weekend Edition and America Amplified.

Joelle Scally

Senior Data Strategist and Researcher, Center for Microeconomic Data, New York Fed

Joelle Scally is a senior data strategist and researcher in the New York Fed’s Center for Microeconomic Data, focusing on the design and use of large and alternative datasets for research. She specializes in the use of credit bureau data for household finance research, and plays a key role in the production of the Quarterly Report on Household Debt and Credit. Prior to joining the New York Fed, Joelle worked as an economist at Benderly Economics. She holds a master’s degree in Quantitative Methods in the Social Sciences from Columbia University and a bachelor’s degree from New York University.

Jenny Schuetz

Senior Fellow, Brookings Metro

Jenny Schuetz is a Senior Fellow at Brookings Metro, and is an expert in urban economics and housing policy. Dr. Schuetz has written numerous peer-reviewed journal articles on land use regulation, housing prices, urban amenities, and neighborhood change. Dr. Schuetz has appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, the PBS NewsHour, The Indicator podcast, Vox, and Slate. 

Dr. Schuetz is the author of Fixer Upper: How to Repair America’s Broken Housing Systems. Topics of recent research include: how statewide zoning reform could improve housing affordability; local strategies to help renters during the COVID-19 crisis; rethinking homeownership incentives to narrow the racial wealth gap; and how housing costs exacerbate economic and racial segregation. 

Before joining Brookings, Dr. Schuetz served as a principal economist at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. Dr. Schuetz was also an assistant professor at the University of Southern California and a post-doctoral fellow at NYU Furman. Dr. Schuetz is a nonresident senior fellow at GWU’s Center for Washington Area Studies and teaches in Georgetown’s urban planning program. 

Dr. Schuetz earned a PhD in public policy from Harvard University, a master’s in city planning from M.I.T., and a B.A. with Highest Distinction in economics and political and social thought from the University of Virginia. 

Lisa Servon

Kevin and Erica Penn Presidential Professor, Department Chair

Lisa Servon was previously Professor of Management and Urban Policy at The New School, where she also served as Dean at the Milano School of International Affairs, Management, and Urban Policy. She conducts research in the areas of urban poverty, community development, economic development, and issues of gender and race. Specific areas of expertise include economic insecurity, consumer financial services, and financial justice.  Servon holds a BA in Political Science from Bryn Mawr College, an MA in History of Art from the University of Pennsylvania, and a PhD in Urban Planning from UC Berkeley. 

Maria Thompson

f. Outreach Manager, Small Business Credit Survey, Cleveland Fed

Maria Thompson is the former outreach manager for the Small Business Credit Survey (SBCS) in the Community Development Department of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland. The SBCS is a national collaboration among the 12 Reserve Banks of the Federal Reserve System to gather timely information on small business economic conditions, financing needs, and credit availability. As the SBCS outreach manager, Ms. Thompson guides and facilitates the survey’s engagement to national partner organizations.

Prior to joining the Cleveland Reserve Bank, Ms. Thompson held leadership positions in the fields of diversity, community economic development, and financial services. Most recently, she was a corporate Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) officer and oversaw bank CRA lending, services, investments, and department operations across multiple states. Her previous roles include adjunct professor and strategic planning, communications, and partnership engagement consultant for a variety of small businesses and community development financial institutions.

Ms. Thompson earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Cleveland State University. With the award of a national merit graduate fellowship, she earned a master’s degree in community development and management from Case Western Reserve University. She is the inaugural recipient of the CWRU Louis Stokes Community Service Leadership Award.