Pressure Mounts on Biden Over Looming Choice of Fed Chair

U.S. President Joe Biden has until February to decide whether he wants to appoint Federal Reserve Board Chair Jerome Powell to a second term, but Democratic politicians and liberal-leaning activist groups are already pressuring the administration to pick someone more progressive to lead the nation's central bank. 

While it may seem early for Washington power players to get wound up over the prospects of a possible replacement for Powell six months from now, the controversy speaks to the extraordinary importance of the job Powell holds.  "The first thing to appreciate is just how powerful the role of the Federal Reserve chair is," said David Wessel, director of the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy at the Brookings Institution. "Whoever holds that job is the single most important economic policymaker in the world, which is why markets all over the globe hang on every adverb and raised eyebrow that comes from the Fed chair. So this is a big deal."  Most experts believe that a reappointment of Powell is the most likely outcome, but that is unlikely to stop activists' attempts to persuade the Democratic president to move in a different direction.