KeithHennessey.com

The President’s Chrysler announcement last Thursday produced mixed results.
The agreement among Chrysler, Fiat, UAW, the Administration, and the large banks appears to increase the probability (from almost zero) that Chrysler will survive for the long run, albeit as a part of Fiat.  This is clearly a good thing. Is it worth the cost to taxpayers [...]

Last December the Congressional Budget Office published a comprehensive paper that describes how they approach analysis of health insurance reform proposals.  It is a critically important (and somewhat technical) document for anyone who cares about health care legislation in the United States.
CBO is the referee for the budgetary costs of legislation.  They estimate the effects [...]

Thanks to Reuters’ MacroScope blog for noticing:
Keith Hennessey, a former top economic adviser to President George W. Bush, saw this one coming. He rightly predicted that the Group of 20 would drop a key word from its communique at the conclusion of the London Summit: Free.

Here is my original post from Wednesday:  A quick guide [...]

The President emphasized the importance of health care reform in Tuesday evening’s press conference.  One of his arguments was that reforming health care would help address federal and state government fiscal problems:
What we have to do is bend the curve on these deficit projections.  And the best way for us to do that is to [...]

I watched the President’s Tuesday evening press conference twice, and have been studying the transcript as well.  I believe the best way to understand a policymaker is simple:  read, watch, or listen to the words that he or she says.  Getting a policymaker’s views through a news filter distorts and loses content.  In this blog, [...]

The President spoke this afternoon about high food prices and food aid.  If you’d like more detail, here’s our “fact sheet”.  And if you really want to dive down deep, here is a transcript of a press briefing done by three senior administration officials after the announcement:  OMB Deputy Director Steve McMillin, CEA Chairman Ed [...]

Last Friday the President spoke about the need for additional Congressional action on the economy.  Outsiders are referring to this as “fiscal stimulus”.  We’ve been calling it a “growth package”.
There’s a lot to say, so I’m going to break this up into three big parts.

what the President proposed;
why the President proposed it; and
today’s [...]

In the Rose Garden last Friday, the President proposed policy changes to address problems in the subprime mortgage market.  Here are his remarks and a fact sheet.
I’m going to do this in three parts:  (1) give a few definitions for those who are new to the housing finance world; (2) define the problem; and (3) [...]

The national average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline is one penny short of its all-time high (adjusted for inflation), at $3.22 per gallon.  That’s about $1 per gallon higher than early last November.  In recent years, it reached $3.04 in September of 2005, and $3.00 in August of 2006.
Q:         Why are gasoline [...]