Unsurprisingly, Trump's Project 2025 would shift money from the middle and lower classes to the wealthy. We've been stuck in this cycle since Ronald Reagan was in office, and Trump would only bring more of the same. In contrast, President Biden took wealthy tax cheats to task, and Trump is a tax cheat, too.
Media Matters reports that MSNBC economic analyst Steve Rattner explained to Joe Scarborough how devastating Project 2025 would be for the economy.
"Look, taxes are obviously perhaps issue number one on the minds of many Americans, and Project '25 is very clear about what it wants to do," Rattner said. "It essentially wants to restructure our tax system into only two tax brackets: 15% for the lowest-earning, less than the Social Security maximum, which is, I think, about $166,000 a year, and 30% for those earning above. But that would radically change how much different Americans pay."
"It would actually increase the amount that people making less than $150,000, less than that cutoff, pay $1,000, $2,000, $2,500," he continued. "They would pay more taxes, but people above, the wealthy, would pay dramatically less taxes. If you earn $400,000 a year, you would get a tax cut of about $14,000. So, an extraordinary shift in the tax burden away from the wealthy and toward the less wealthy."
Scarborough weighed in to ask if Project 2025 would increase the burden on people with student loans.
"So, in terms of the monthly student loan payments, for the people at the bottom, their monthly average student payments would go from $78 to $308," Rattner said. "So a huge increase for those with very little college, people who don't probably have great jobs, and for whom this is a big burden. And then smaller increases but still substantial all the way up to people who have master's degrees. So, completely wiping out everything the Biden administration has done for the last three and a half years."
Scarborough said, "And Donald Trump, I mean, if he really does embrace 2025 like he said in the past, he's going to support more massive cuts to Medicare and Medicaid."
"You're right, Joe. Medicaid, I think there's something like 90,000,000 people on Medicaid in America, 38,000,000 children," Rattner said. "So you're right. It is not just some urban program for a few poor people. And what Project 2025 wants to do is put limits on how long you can stay on Medicaid, effectively kick people off Medicaid, put in work requirements, put in a whole number of restrictions that would dramatically change the number of people who are on Medicaid."
"But it's also a question politically of whether this is really a great idea for the Republicans to embrace, because Medicaid is actually extraordinarily popular," Rattner added. "Not surprisingly, it's supported by 90% of Democrats versus only 8% who have an unfavorable view of it. But even among Republicans, 65% of Republicans think favorably about Medicaid, and only 32% think unfavorably about Medicaid. So it's terrible policy. It also may be terrible politics for the Republicans to embrace proposals like this."
Republican voters listen to Fox News sound bites, and they likely don't realize that their benefits are at stake, too. It's the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party, after all. And they'll get their faces eaten, too. The plan would also eliminate “most deductions, credits, and exclusions, and that includes tax breaks for state and local taxes and education.
CNBC reports:
Higher estate and gift tax exemptions enacted via the TCJA are scheduled to sunset after 2025. But the plan calls for making the 2017 TCJA changes permanent and reducing the estate and gift tax rate to a maximum of 20%, down from 40%.
Fewer than 1% of taxpayers were subject to estate tax in 2023, according to Tax Policy Center estimates.
“If you’re one of those people, your heirs would be very happy with this proposal,” Gleckman said
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It's another gift for the wealthiest as if they need to be coddled while regular Americans are working two jobs to meet the rent. Trump would be one of those people who would be "happy with this proposal."
