, and we have lived in palo alto, california ; princeton, new jersey ; and now washington. we have two children, a son and a daughter, now in graduate school and college, respectively. my wife is a teacher and is meeting her classes today in a public charter high school in washington. although the idea of leaving dillon to attend college was exciting for me, i realize now that i learned a lot from living here for seventeen years. i learned, among many other lessons, a few things about work. i saw the long hours and persistent effort my parents put in to make their independent small business successful. after i graduated from high school i spent the summer as a construction worker helping to build dillon ’ s saint eugene hospital, and during the summers of my college years, i waited tables six days a week at the south of the border. i took two lessons from those experiences : first, in small towns like dillon and in communities all across the united states, people work very hard every day to support themselves and their families. i remember that, on the first day i came home from the construction site that summer, i was too tired to eat and i fell asleep in my chair. the second thing i learned in dillon is that americans are economically ambitious ; they seek opportunity and advancement. i remember the fellow construction worker who wanted to become foreman someday and a waitress who was saving to go to college. i was impressed by these experiences, and i think they were an important reason i went into economics, which a great economist once called the study of people in the ordinary business of life. now i am an economic policy maker, and i sit in a nice office in washington looking at reports and tables of data and following the fluctuations of the financial markets. however, i try not to forget what underlies all those data : millions of americans working hard, trying to better themselves economically, struggling to manage their family finances, and worrying about the price of gas and college tuition. i take my work extremely seriously because i know that, if my colleagues at the federal reserve and i do our jobs right, we will help our economy prosper and give more people the economic opportunities they seek. let me thank you all again for inviting me back to dillon and for sharing this morning with me.

wealth among the wealthiest white families than for other races and ethnicities. - 9that said, the benefits of a lengthy recovery can only go so far, as the research points to some barriers to labor market outcomes for particular groups that appear to be structural. after controlling for sectoral and educational differences, the research suggests that these factors include discrimination as well as differences in access to quality education and informal social networks that may be an important source of information and support regarding employment opportunities. 13 federal reserve work on labor market disparities while the policy tools available to the federal reserve are not well suited to addressing the barriers that contribute to persistent disparities in labor market outcomes, understanding these barriers and efforts to address them is vital in assessing maximum employment as well as potential growth. the federal reserve is deeply engaged in understanding disparities through our data collection, research collaboration, and community development work. one way the federal reserve seeks to obtain a clearer picture is by collecting data ourselves. for instance, some of the data i have cited today come from the federal reserve ’ s triennial survey of consumer finances, which provides detailed information on income and wealth holdings by demographic groups. the survey of household economics and decisionmaking provides a portrait of household finances, employment, housing, and debt ; the survey of young workers provides insights into younger adults ’ employment experiences soon after entering the labor force ; and the enterprising and informal work activities survey provides information about income for example, see fryer ( 2011 ) and ritter and taylor ( 2011 ). - 10 generating activities that are often outside the scope of other employment and income surveys. 14 each recent edition of the semiannual monetary policy report ( mpr ) has focused on some aspect of the comparative economic experience of different racial and ethnic groups. in addition, as indicated in the minutes published after each meeting of the federal open market committee ( fomc ), federal reserve staff regularly report on the differential labor experiences of different racial and ethnic groups as background for the fomc ’ s deliberations on monetary policy. across the federal reserve system, a variety of initiatives are aimed at understanding economic disparities and how to foster more - inclusive growth. the opportunity and inclusive growth institute at the federal reserve bank of minneapolis brings together researchers from a variety of fields to analyze barriers to economic opportunity and advancement. the economic growth and mobility project at the federal reserve bank of philadelphia aims to bring together researchers with community stakeholders to focus on differences in poverty and economic mobility across