Yellen rallies Treasury staff to battle coronavirus recession

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Tuesday sought to rally department employees as the Biden administration tackles the economic damage wrought by the coronavirus pandemic.

In a letter to Treasury staff hours after she was sworn in, Yellen laid out the crucial challenges facing the administration as the U.S. reels from the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

“I know many Treasury employees have been responding to the economic emergency since the beginning,” Yellen wrote to the Treasury Department’s 84,000 employees.

“But now we must complete the task. We must help the American people endure the final months of this pandemic by making sure they have roofs over their head and food on the table. Then, we must assist them in getting back to work safely.”

Yellen was confirmed Monday by the Senate as the first woman to serve as Treasury secretary and the first person to lead the department, the Federal Reserve Board, and the White House Counsel of Economic Advisors. 

In her letter, Yellen evoked working with Treasury staffers during the height of the 2007-08 financial crisis and recession. She was the president of the San Francisco Fed at the time.

“Your work helped save the economy from its worst crisis since the Depression,” Yellen said of the Great Recession.

“Now we need to do it again.”

The Treasury Department is currently handling the distribution of another round of direct payments approved in December and attempting to help those who did not receive their first owed stimulus checks retrieve their money. The department is also helping administer the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) emergency lending program for small businesses.

While fighting the coronavirus recession is the top priority for Yellen, she said that Treasury will also play integral roles in fighting other crises—most of which began much earlier than the pandemic.

“People worry about a K-shaped recovery to the pandemic – and that is a cause for concern – but long before COVID-19 infected a single individual, we were living in a K-shaped economy, one where wealth built on wealth while certain segments of the population fell further and further behind,” Yellen wrote.

The secretary added that Treasury “can play a major role”  in the Biden administration’s fights against climate change and systemic racism.

“Indeed, the reason I went from academia to government is because I believe economic policy can be a potent tool to improve society. We can – and should – use it to address inequality, racism, and climate change,” Yellen wrote.