Remarks by Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen at the Institute of International Finance Annual Membership Meeting

As Prepared for Delivery 

Tim, thank you very much for your kind words. I am honored to receive the Institute of International Finance’s Distinguished Leadership and Service Award. And let me thank you as well for your leadership of IIF. Over the past few years, and no doubt informed by your own time at Treasury, IIF members have provided us with important perspectives on a wide range of key policy issues, strengthening our work. 

Here at home, and thanks to the Biden-Harris Administration’s economic agenda, the past year has been characterized by a combination of developments few thought possible. Inflation is significantly down while the unemployment rate remains near historic lows. Economic growth has been strong, bolstered by robust consumer spending and business investment. Looking forward, we are aiming to maintain this momentum, while also addressing long-standing challenges such as the high prices of essentials like housing and health care. We’re pursuing a strategy I have called modern supply-side economics, which aims to expand our economy’s capacity to produce while reducing inequality. 

America’s strong economic performance is also helping power the global economy, which has proven more resilient than forecasters had expected despite unforeseen shocks. But we know that progress has also been uneven. Many economies, including emerging markets and developing countries, are still struggling to recover from their COVID recessions and from the shock to global food and energy prices exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. As we look ahead, global challenges like climate change, pandemics, and conflict and fragility threaten to hold back global growth.

So, from the start of this Administration, we have also charted a new course for America’s international economic policy. We rejected American isolationism and have instead promoted America’s global economic leadership. We’ve focused on stabilizing and strengthening relationships. We’ve worked multilaterally. And importantly, we’ve also seen the private sector—including the financial institutions represented in this room—as a key partner in tackling challenges and in realizing opportunities. 

Take climate change. The Inflation Reduction Act is our country’s most significant climate legislation in history, and it works by giving the private sector the incentives and certainty it needs to invest. According to one estimate, public investments have been met by more than five times as much in private investments. In just the two years since the IRA was passed, this has meant a total of nearly half a trillion in investments in manufacturing and deploying clean energy technologies. 

Abroad, our efforts to drive progress toward a lower-carbon economy extend to working with international partners to implement ambitious Just Energy Transition Partnerships that will crowd in private capital. And we’re channeling private capital to other areas too. The United States launched the G7 Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment to help close the world’s significant infrastructure investment gap and we’ve made increasing private sector mobilization at the multilateral development banks a key part of our MDB evolution agenda. 

We of course are working closely with the private sector not only to fuel growth but also to mitigate risks to financial stability, from combatting cyber risks to advancing work on artificial intelligence and tokenization and cross-border payments. 

I’ll be focused on many of these priorities during the Annual Meetings this week and I’m glad to have the chance to reflect on them here with you today. Thank you again for this honor, and I look forward to our discussion.

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