Women In Public Service (audio)

Dr. Alice Rivlin, an economist and former cabinet officer, is a nationally recognized expert on fiscal and monetary policy. She earned her doctorate at Harvard, and later served as Assistant Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare during the administration of President Lyndon Johnson. She was the founding director of the Congressional Budget Office, heading the body from 1975 to 1983. On leaving the CBO, she was the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation Prize Fellowship, the so-called "genius grant." Rivlin later served in the cabinet of President Clinton as Director of the Office of Management and Budget. In 1998, when the city of Washington, D.C. was $700 million in debt, Congress took over its finances and President Clinton appointed Rivlin to oversee a rescue effort. She skillfully chaired the Financial Responsibility and Management Assistance Authority, saving the city from bankruptcy. In the 1990s, she also served as Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve. More recently, she was a member of President Obama