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Sheila C. Bair

Lawyer, professor and banking administrator. Born 1954.

Raised in Independence, Bair received a law degree from the University of Kansas in 1978.  Bair has held positions in education, law, politics and banking regulation.  She began her career in the General Counsel’s office of the former U.S. Department of Health Education and Welfare.  In 2006 she was appointed to a five-year term by President George W. Bush as chair of the U.S. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).  Forbes magazine ranked her as the second most powerful woman in the world after German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Before her appointment to the FDIC she was a professor of financial regulatory policy at the University of Massachusetts Amherst where she had been since 2002. Her background includes a number of other positions which gave her extensive experience in finance. She has served as assistant secretary for financial institutions at the U. S. Department of the Treasury, senior vice president for government relations of the New York Stock Exchange, a commissioner and acting chair of  the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and research director, deputy counsel, and counsel to Robert Dole when he was senate majority leader. She was named the Native Sons and Daughters' Distinguished Kansan in 2010.

Entry: Bair, Sheila C.

Author: G. Joseph Pierron

Author information: Judge Pierron serves on the Kansas Court of Appeals and has an interest in Kansas history.

Date Created: March 2012

Date Modified: August 2013

The author of this article is solely responsible for its content.