- [Christina] The most important thing
that I try to pass on

is the sense that economics
is an empirical field,

then if you get
new empirical evidence,

you're going to have
to change the way

you think about the economy.

I think being open to that

is the most important thing
for a young economist to know.

Economists -- not a group
with a lot of Marys, Natashas or Juanitas,

and that's caused a lot of controversy.

However, what's often overlooked
are the actual female economists

who are pushing economics forward

by addressing real-world issues.

Welcome to Women in Economics.

♪ [music] ♪

I grew up in a family

where public policy
was discussed a lot.

I was planning to be a lawyer,

so I was going to major
in Government.

And as part of the Government
major at my college,

you had to take
a year of Economics.

I was about three weeks in,
and I was hooked,

like the government major's gone,
the lawyer's gone,

I was in an Economist.

Christina Romer
is a macro economic historian.

She takes the tools
of modern economics,

statistics, and data

and applies them
to historical questions.

- [Narrator] Christie's researcher agenda
throughout her career

has focused on a course set of topics

about economic fluctuations
and business cycles.

She's been asking and answering fascinating questions about our economy,

starting with her dissertation as a graduate student at MIT.

There, she changed her understanding of how the economy has grown over time.

I think the questions that came to me were about monetary policy and business cycles and the Great Depression.