Phyllis A. Wallace (June 9, 1921 – January 10, 1993) was an American economist and activist, as well as the first woman to receive a doctorate of economics at Yale University.
She received her bachelor's degree in economics in 1943, graduating magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa.
[5] In 1953, Phyllis took a teaching position in the School of Business Administration at the historically-black Atlanta University while maintaining her research relationship with NBER.
Was the deep south during the Jim Crow era too much for Phyllis or was the pull of family and international research the draw?
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 led to the establishment of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission the next year.
The EEOC's mandate: to "ensure equality of opportunity by vigorously enforcing federal legislation prohibiting discrimination in employment" whether on the basis of religion, race, sex, color, national origin, age, or disability.
In this job, Phyllis reached out to senior economists and also to young scholars who would go on to distinguished academic careers (Orley Ashenfelter (Princeton), James Heckman (University of Chicago), Ronald Oaxaca (University of Arizona), Lester Thurow (MIT) and Ann Dryden Witte (Wellesley College).
Through Phyllis, economists had pathbreaking access to data sets that, when analyzed, advanced economic understanding of employment discrimination.
Analysis of the data resulted in a landmark settlement in January 1973 that provided for payment of back wages and benefits to women and minority AT&T employees.