Trump's budget: Big gifts for the rich, big cuts for the poor
- By Fernanda Nunes
- 3768 views
President Trump's first budget can be summed up like this: Big gifts for the rich, big cuts for the poor.
He would give a lot more money to the defense industry and wealthy taxpayers, and he would pay for that with an unprecedented slashing of safety net programs for America's poor.
Cuts to federal worker retirement programs ($63 billion over 10 years) Mulvaney probably should have added a fifth bullet: Disability programs also get a massive haircut.
What is known so far is that the wealthy -- including Trump himself -- would likely pay a lot less in taxes.
Trump is giving rich investors (who earn over $200,000 a year) a tax break while half of America has nothing invested in the stock market, mostly because they don't have extra money to invest.
"This is the centerpiece of the spending proposal -- cuts of nearly $1 trillion over 10 years in Medicaid, food stamps and other anti-poverty programs,"
Related: Trump's budget could be tricky for the GOP The budget math doesn't add up Experts across the political spectrum say the biggest problem with Trump's budget is that the math doesn't add up.
The president is already backtracking on that vow a little by proposing cuts to Social Security Disability Insurance, but Mulvaney argues that's a different animal than Social Security for the elderly.
On top of that, Trump also adds $54 billion more to defense spending and "the biggest tax cut in the history of this country."
About every economist agrees that innovation and training kids for the jobs of tomorrow are critical to a healthy economy going forward, especially if Trump hopes to take America from 1.9% growth a year to 3%.
The budget so far is shaping up as good for the wealthy, terrible for the poor and a question mark for the middle class.
Source: CNN Money
