While Donald Trump's "Big, Beautiful Bill" will provide a hefty tax cut to the rich, low-income Americans and future generations will end up paying for it, the Congressional Budget Office found.
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In a city in which partisanship rules, the number-crunchers at the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) are among the fairest arbiters around. On Tuesday, they issued their verdict on how Donald Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” will affect Americans… and it is hardly surprising.
In a letter to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-PA), the ranking member of the House Budget Committee, CBO Director Phillip Swagel noted that, on average, households will see an increase in their resources when combining tax cuts and the changes in government services provided (or not provided to them.
However, he added that these changes would not be evenly distributed.
“The agency estimates that in general, resources would decrease for households in the lowest decile (tenth) of the income distribution, whereas resources would increase for households in the highest decile,” Swagel stated.
In other words, the legislation will do exactly what Democrats have said it will do: Take money from the poor and give it to the rich.
While Republicans say that the bill will provide tax cuts to households of all income levels, they always keep forgetting to mention that these tax cuts are funded in part by eliminating services the government provides to low-income Americans.
In this case, while families will get a bit more money back, millions of them will lose their health insurance coverage through Medicaid and food aid they get through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
On balance, this amounts to a loss of resources for them.
“CBO estimates that household resources would decrease by an amount equal to about 2 percent of income in the lowest decile (tenth) of the income distribution in 2027 and 4 percent in 2033, mainly as a result of losses of in-kind transfers, such as Medicaid and SNAP,” Swagel stated. “By contrast, resources would increase by an amount equal to 4 percent for households in the highest decile in 2027 and 2 percent in 2033, mainly because of reductions in the taxes they owe.”
There you have it: If the “Big, Beautiful Bill” passes, low-income families will have fewer resources available to them while the richest Americans will get a nice tax cut.
It should also be noted that these tax cuts are so extensive that slashing Medicaid and SNAP alone will not pay for them.
The bulk of the more than $3.7 trillion that the tax cuts costs will be added to the national debt and passed on to future generations.
