Kevin Hassett

Kevin Hassett
Director of the National Economic Council
Assumed office
January 20, 2025
PresidentDonald Trump
Preceded byLael Brainard
Senior Advisor to the President for Economic Issues
In office
April 15, 2020 – July 1, 2020
PresidentDonald Trump
Preceded byPosition established
Succeeded byVacant
29th Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers
In office
September 13, 2017 – June 28, 2019
PresidentDonald Trump
Preceded byJason Furman
Succeeded byCecilia Rouse
Personal details
Born
Kevin Allen Hassett

(1962-03-20) March 20, 1962 (age 64)
Greenfield, Massachusetts, U.S.
Political partyRepublican
Spouse(s)Kristie
Children2
EducationSwarthmore College (BA)
University of Pennsylvania
(MA, PhD)

Kevin Allen Hassett (born March 20, 1962) is an American economist and politician who has been the Director of the National Economic Council since 2025. He was the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers from September 13, 2017 to June 28, 2019. He is known for his work on tax policy and for co-authoring the book Dow 36,000 (1999).

Hassett was the chair in American Politics and Culture and Director of Research for Domestic Policy at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank. Hassett was John McCain's chief economic adviser in the 2000 presidential primaries and an economic adviser to the campaigns of George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential election and McCain in the presidential election of 2008. He was among Mitt Romney's economic advisers for the 2012 presidential campaign.

In April 2017, President Donald Trump nominated Hassett to serve as the 29th chair of the Council of Economic Advisers. He served in the role until his resignation in 2019. In November 2024, President-elect Trump nominated Hassett to be Director of the National Economic Council.

Early life

Hassett was born in Greenfield, Massachusetts. He received a B.A. in economics from Swarthmore College and a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Pennsylvania.

Career

Hassett was an assistant professor of economics at Columbia Business School from 1989 to 1993 and an associate professor there from 1993 to 1994. From 1992 to 1997, Hassett was an economist in the Division of Research and Statistics at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. He was a policy consultant to the United States Department of the Treasury during the George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton administrations.

Hassett joined the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) as a resident scholar in 1997. He worked on tax policy, fiscal policy, energy issues, and investing in the stock market. In 2003, Hassett was named director of economic policy studies at AEI. Hassett wrote columns in newspapers like The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. He writes a monthly column for National Review and, since 2005, a weekly column for Bloomberg.

Council of Economic Advisers

In early 2017, Hassett was nominated by U.S. President Donald Trump to become the 29th chair of the Council of Economic Advisers. The United States Senate confirmed him with a 81-16 vote on September 12, 2017. He was sworn in on September 13, 2017.

On September 13, 2018, on an official visit to Ireland, he was asked if the U.S. thought of Ireland as a tax haven to which he defended Ireland by saying that the U.S. tax law system was "written by someone on acid". Hassett had called Ireland as a tax haven on several interviews.

On June 2, 2019, Hassett announced his resignation.

Senior Economic Advisor

In March 2020, it was announced that Hassett would work at the White House again for a short time to advise President Trump on economic policy during the COVID-19 pandemic. In April 2020, the Trump administration announced Hassett's appointment as a senior advisor.

Hassett, who had no experience in infectious disease predictions, built a model that predicted a far lower coronavirus death rate than what actually happened. Hassett's model said that the number of deaths from the virus would drop to near zero by May 15. Hassett's model went against the opinions of public health experts.

National Economic Council

On November 26, 2024, President-elect Trump nominated Hassett to serve as the Director of the National Economic Council under his second administration.

References

  1. ↑ Thomas, Lauren; Mui, Ylan (February 24, 2017). "Trump picks conservative think tanker to chair Council of Economic Advisers". CNBC. Retrieved 18 April 2017.
  2. ↑ Who Are Obama's and Romney's Key Economic Advisers?
  3. 1 2 "Trump expected to name Kevin Hassett to lead National Economic Council". Politico. November 26, 2024. Retrieved November 26, 2024.
  4. 1 2 Kevin Hassett curriculum vitae on AEI website.
  5. ↑ "Kevin Allen Hassett". bloomberg.com. March 27, 2011.
  6. ↑ Michelle Jamrisko (April 7, 2017). "Trump Names Hassett to Head Council of Economic Advisers". Bloomberg News. Retrieved April 9, 2017.
  7. ↑ Long, Heather (2017-04-10). "Meet Trump's newest economic adviser: Kevin Hassett". CNNMoney. Archived from the original on 2017-04-10. Retrieved 2017-04-11.
  8. ↑ Lawler, Joseph (September 12, 2017). "Roll call vote PN457". United States Senate. Retrieved 12 September 2017.
  9. ↑ "'It's not Ireland's fault US tax law was written by someone on acid'". Irish Independent. September 13, 2018. The economist [Kevin Hassett], who has previously referred to the Republic as a tax haven, said there had been a need to introduce reforms in the US, which have brought its corporate rate down to 21 per cent.
  10. ↑ Seamus Coffey, Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (July 18, 2018). "When can we expect the next wave of IP onshoring?". Economics Incentives, University College Cork. IP onshoring is something we should be expecting to see much more of as we move towards the end of the decade. Buckle up!
  11. ↑ Nick Timiraos; Alex Leary (2 June 2019). "Kevin Hassett, Chairman of Council of Economic Advisers, to Leave Post". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 3 June 2019.
  12. ↑ Nam, Rafael (March 20, 2020). "Economist Kevin Hassett returns to White House to advise Trump amid coronavirus". TheHill.
  13. ↑ "White House to bring Hassett back as economic adviser amid crisis". POLITICO. March 20, 2020.
  14. ↑ "Trump brings back Kevin Hassett as temporary economic adviser". Reuters. March 20, 2020 – via reuters.com.
  15. ↑ "President Donald J. Trump Announces Addition to White House Staff". whitehouse.gov – via National Archives.
  16. 1 2 "34 days of pandemic: Inside Trump's desperate attempts to reopen America". The Washington Post. 2020.
  17. ↑ "Draft report predicts covid-19 cases will reach 200,000 a day by June 1". The Washington Post. May 4, 2020. Retrieved May 4, 2020.
  18. ↑ Zeballos-Roig, Joseph. "A White House economic adviser devised a head-scratching model that shows coronavirus deaths will hit 0 in just 10 days". Business Insider. Retrieved 2020-05-05.

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