Interview with Bill Isaac: Economic Philosophy


by Rick Sarkar '19; featuring Bill Isaac, Former Chair of the FDIC, on the State of the Economy

Over the Trustee Weekend, Connor Browder ’19 and I had the pleasure of interviewing an SM parent and trustee Bill Isaac. Mr. Isaac is the former chair of the FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation), the government department charged with insurance banks and maintaining public confidence in them, and today he is a Senior Managing Director at FTI Consulting in Sarasota, Florida. He served as the chair of the FDIC during the 1980s, in a tumultuous time for the economy, in which he had to manage nearly 3,000 bank failures. We discussed his economic philosophy (at the start of the video), tax legislation (at 2:16), banking regulations (at 6:45), current day polarization in America (at 15:32), and advice for high schoolers like us (at 18:39). A slightly condensed version of our interview is below. If you wish to see more from our interview, including information about Mr. Isaac’s role at the FDIC and his thoughts on Janet Yellen as the chair of the Federal Reserve, please feel free to reach out to me.