Elizabeth E. (Betsy) Bailey

Betsy Bailey was a trailblazing economist and passionate advocate for women, widely recognized as opening doors for women both in her field and in business, in general. She was the first woman to earn a Ph.D. in economics from Princeton University, to be appointed department head at Bell Laboratories, and to become dean at a top graduate business school – the Tepper School of Business.

As the dean of the Tepper School, she highlighted the use of information technology in business, requiring students to use early PC’s and encouraging faculty to adopt internal computer network communication.

Bailey was born in New York to history professors. She earned her bachelor’s from Radcliffe College in 1960, a master’s from Steven Institute of Technology in 1966, and her Ph.D. from Princeton in 1972. She then began her career at Bell Laboratories, rising from computer programmer to research department head.

She was named the first woman commissioner of the Civil Aeronautics Board by President Jimmy Carter in 1977 and the first woman vice chairman by President Ronald Reagan, overseeing the deregulation of the U.S. airline industry. She then served as Tepper School dean from 1983-1990 before joining the Wharton School in 1991 from which she retired in 2010.

Among her honors, Bailey was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, held a chair at the National Bureau of Economic Research, and received the Carolyn Shaw Bell award from the American Economic Association.