Thanks to Chris Mayer for taking the time to comment on my earlier posting and for providing more information about his mortgage relief and stimulus proposal (with Glenn Hubbard). First, let’s focus on his statement that, “Servicers must run any program, but ours would be directed by the Treasury Department and would require compliance.”  HAMP, the administration’s troubled mortgage modification program, is run by the Treasury Department and theoretically requires compliance by participating servicers, but that is very different from actual compliance. Servicers, as I noted before, have done “a terrible job” under HAMP, to quote Secretary Geithner, who nonetheless has refrained from invoking enforcement powers. Debtors frequently experience a run-around trying to get a HAMP modification.

(more…)