[[link removed]]

REPUBLICAN AGENDA’S “TRIPLE THREAT” TO LOW- AND MODERATE-INCOME
FAMILY WELL-BEING  
[[link removed]]


 

Brendan Duke, Gbenga Ajilore
April 4, 2025
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
[[link removed]]


*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

_ Legislation, Executive Actions, and Tariffs Will Harm Millions _

, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities

 

The Trump Administration and Republican majorities in both houses of
Congress are advancing a policy agenda that deeply threatens millions
of families’ ability to afford the basics by making it harder for
them to secure health coverage, buy groceries, or afford everyday
goods — all while pursuing expensive tax cuts that are skewed toward
the wealthy.

The centerpiece of that agenda is far-reaching tax and budget
legislation intended to be passed through the fast-track budget
“reconciliation” process. But that legislation works hand-in-hand
with other Administration policies, both accelerating and deepening
the damage to families with modest incomes. It includes an executive
action agenda that unlawfully stops funding for public services and
investments, hollows out and politicizes the civil service, and
undermines basic governance. It also includes sweeping tariffs — the
highest in more than a century and eight times higher than they were
last year — that will cost low- and moderate-income families
hundreds if not thousands of dollars, more than offsetting whatever
modest tax cuts they may receive from tax legislation.

This three-part agenda — legislation, executive action, and tariffs
— the Trump Administration and congressional Republicans are
pursuing will reduce the living standards and raise costs for millions
of families with modest incomes while helping pave the way for tax
cuts skewed to the wealthy.
[[link removed]]

This three-part agenda — legislation, executive action, and tariffs
— the Trump Administration and congressional Republicans are
pursuing will reduce the living standards and raise costs for millions
of families with modest incomes while helping pave the way for tax
cuts skewed to the wealthy. And it’s important to understand that
the justification for this upward income redistribution — faster
economic growth — is unlikely to materialize. In fact, the sweeping
tariffs that Trump has imposed have heightened the risks of a
recession — and low-paid workers will bear the brunt.

To illustrate the distributional consequences of this triple threat
policy agenda, we show in Figure 1 below that the combination of
extending the 2017 tax law, deep cuts to Medicaid and SNAP consistent
with the House budget, and the tariffs announced in 2025
would _reduce_ the income of households in the bottom 60 percent of
the income distribution by an average of $1,550, or the equivalent of
about three months of groceries. Meanwhile, the package
would _increase_ the income of households with incomes in the top 1
percent by an average of $29,630. The chart in some ways understates
the potential harms for families because it does not include the
effects of the Administration’s extraordinary executive actions.

These policies would affect families of all races by reducing
assistance or access to assistance while raising costs, but would
particularly affect communities of color given their lower incomes due
to past and ongoing discrimination in areas like housing and hiring.

Far from shared sacrifice, this fiscal policy agenda hurts the people,
families, and communities the President pledged to serve during the
campaign. It reduces the living standards of low- and moderate-income
people across the U.S., who need more support, to finance unnecessary
tax cuts for the wealthiest people.

The Trump Administration’s Main Goal: Tax Cuts for the Wealthy
Financed by Cutting Health Coverage and Food Assistance That Millions
of Families Need

The centerpiece of the Trump Administration’s economic agenda is
legislation enacting large tax cuts skewed to the wealthy and
corporations while making deep cuts to programs low- and
moderate-income people rely on and a wide range of public services.

The Trump Administration’s main policy priority is extending the
expiring provisions of the 2017 tax cuts as part of a party-line bill
using the fast-track reconciliation process. The annual cost of
extending the individual and estate tax provisions of the 2017 tax law
is about $400 billion, which would severely erode the revenue base.[1]
[[link removed]] The
economic benefits of the law fell far short of the proponents’
claims, failing to significantly boost economic growth, investment, or
workers’ earnings.

Extending the expiring tax cuts would, however, deliver large benefits
for the wealthy: millionaire households would get tax cuts averaging
$54,190 and a 2.9 percent increase in their after-tax incomes
according to the Tax Policy Center.[2]
[[link removed]] Indeed,
roughly half the cost of extending the expiring tax cuts would flow to
households with incomes in the top 5 percent.[3]
[[link removed]]

The House-passed budget resolution calls for $4.5 trillion of tax cuts
over the fiscal year 2025-2034 budget window, more than enough to
cover the cost of extending the expiring individual and estate tax
cuts over that period.[4]
[[link removed]] As
a result, the House budget creates room for additional tax cuts.
Several leading House Republicans have signaled that enacting a series
of business-related tax cuts related to the 2017 tax law as well as
increasing the amount of state and local taxes high earners can deduct
are priorities that could be added to take up that extra room.[5]
[[link removed]] These
policy changes would increase both the size of the tax cuts received
by high earners and the regressivity of the package, likely exceeding
the generosity of any populist-sounding tax breaks like “no tax on
tips” that are included.[6]
[[link removed]]

The House budget then instructs several House committees to achieve
various levels of savings to help offset the cost of the tax cuts.
(See Figure 2.) It requires the Energy and Commerce Committee to cut
at least $880 billion; the Agriculture Committee to cut at least $230
billion; the Education and Workforce Committee to cut at least $330
billion; and other committees to also cut programs to reach a
cumulative target of at least $1.5 trillion in cuts through 2034.[7]
[[link removed]] Moreover,
these committee targets are minimums or “floors” — meaning the
committees must cut at least that amount and may cut more. In fact, a
provision in the House budget pushes the committees to cut more, by
requiring the overall level of program cuts to reach $2 trillion to
retain the full $4.5 trillion in tax cuts.

Given the magnitude of these reductions and the programs within the
jurisdiction of these committees, these congressional committees would
have no alternative but to make enormous cuts in Medicaid, the
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), student loan
assistance and other vital sources of support to make their math work
as they develop the reconciliation spending and tax bill that follows
the budget resolution. Congressional Republicans have, at times,
denied the budget resolution means cuts to Medicaid and SNAP despite
assigning significant deficit reduction to the committees overseeing
those programs.[8]
[[link removed]] Yet,
it would be impossible for the Energy and Commerce Committee to reach
its deficit reduction target while avoiding cuts to Medicaid without
cutting Medicare, or for the Agriculture Committee to avoid cuts to
SNAP without cutting farm aid by 75 percent (something House
Republicans have not even floated).[9]
[[link removed]]

These massive cuts in health coverage and food assistance cannot be
achieved through efficiency; they would require taking food assistance
and health coverage away or cutting benefits significantly. Some 72
million people get their health coverage through Medicaid or the
Children’s Health Insurance Program and 40 million people help each
month buying food through SNAP.[10]
[[link removed]]

The Budget Lab at Yale recently illustrated the potential harm of the
tax and spending policies inherent in the House budget by calculating
the net effects for different income groups of extending the 2017 tax
law and making the cuts to Medicaid and SNAP suggested in the House
budget.[11]
[[link removed]] The
Budget Lab found that this would reduce the incomes of families with
incomes in the bottom 40 percent while leaving the tax cuts for the
top 1 percent of families essentially unchanged.[12]
[[link removed]]

The new Senate budget retains the instructions to House committees
analyzed above but, in an extraordinary sleight of hand, its
instructions to Senate committees do not match the House instructions.
The Senate committees with jurisdiction over SNAP and student loans
are directed to cut at least $1 billion over ten years, rather than
the far higher levels in the House instructions. The instruction to
the Finance Committee, which is responsible both for the tax
provisions and Medicaid, does not explicitly assume large Medicaid
cuts either.

While the Senate could in theory craft a reconciliation bill that only
hits the _de minimis_ program cut targets assigned to the Senate
committees, nothing in the Senate resolution would prevent the same
large cuts to health, food assistance, and student aid that the very
same resolution _directs_ House committees to achieve. And given
that some conservative Senators have called for enacting program cuts
that are _deeper _than those assigned in the House, and the budget
resolution and congressional budget rules allow for that outcome, the
threat that the ultimate reconciliation bill will deepen poverty,
raise costs, and leave more people uninsured is extremely high.[13]
[[link removed]]

Aggressive Executive Actions Aim to Cut Critical Services and Reduce
Benefit Access While Undermining Basic Governance

At the same time the Trump Administration and congressional
Republicans are pursuing enormous cuts to programs through the
legislative process, the Administration (with the support of
congressional Republicans) is using executive actions to attack a
range of public services that low- and moderate-income families need.
Moreover, their actions are undermining basic governance, which will
have wide-reaching effects on the economy and likely increase the
deficit, despite the Administration’s claims to the contrary.

Executive Actions Are Taking Aim at Critical Retirement and Health
Care Programs

The Administration and its “Department of Government Efficiency”
(DOGE) headed by Elon Musk have targeted the Social Security
Administration (SSA) for staffing and service cuts. (See Figure 3.)
The agency was already experiencing serious customer service
challenges, including long hold times on the phone, long waits for
in-person appointments, and record-long waits for disability
determinations — fueled by long-time inadequate funding and
understaffing.[14]
[[link removed]]

Yet Musk and DOGE are pushing deep cuts to SSA staff, placing new
restrictions on phone-based services, and shuttering SSA field offices
— further degrading services for millions of people who receive or
apply for Social Security benefits each year.[15]
[[link removed]] (See
Figure 3.) These moves, along with actions threatening the security of
people’s personal information, are placing the operational
reliability of SSA’s systems at risk, prompting former SSA leaders
and high-ranking career staff who have served Presidents of both
parties to raise alarms.[16]
[[link removed]]

In another example, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS)
has issued a proposed Affordable Care Act marketplace regulation that
would reduce marketplace enrollment by between 750,000 and 2 million
people and raise premium costs for millions more people, CMS
estimates.[17]
[[link removed]]

Executive Actions Undermining Governance Will Negatively Impact
Everyone

The Administration is also implementing large-scale staffing
reductions across the government through buy-outs, terminations of
probationary employees, and now through layoffs being executed through
a “reductions in force” (RIFs) process.[18]
[[link removed]] The
firings are occurring despite fiscal year 2025 funding levels for most
annually appropriated (or discretionary) programs being held at last
year’s levels and there being sufficient funding to staff these
agencies without staffing reductions.

The effects of the Administration’s proposed staffing cuts put a
wide range of core government services — in addition to those
delivered by SSA and HHS, as we described above — at risk. For
example:

* layoffs at the National Weather Service could reduce the
country’s capacity to collect, analyze, and disseminate data on
drought, flood, and extreme heat emergencies. These data are
particularly important for farmers who make decisions based on these
data;
* layoffs at the Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service could
mean less access to expertise to manage forests to decrease fire risk
and fewer personnel to fight increasingly large and deadly fires,
endangering millions of people;
* layoffs at the National Institutes of Health could mean less
research on preventing and curing diseases; and
* layoffs at the Office of Civil Rights at the Department of
Education — the office that parents can turn to when their schools
are not meeting their obligations — may hobble its capacity to
investigate discrimination against students, including discrimination
based on race and disability status.

The Administration has justified many of these staffing reductions as
helping reduce the deficit — despite total employee costs making up
a small fraction of the federal budget. Perhaps most perversely, it
has also proposed a 20 percent cut in IRS staff heavily targeted at
the enforcement functions that ensure tax cheats pay their taxes. This
would _increase_ the deficit by about $160 billion over ten years,
an analysis by the Budget Lab at Yale found.[19]
[[link removed]]

The large-scale staffing reductions are just one way the
Administration has tried to circumvent enacted funding laws. It’s
also withheld funding broadly for entire agencies such as USAID and
has terminated grants and contracts for services that nonprofits and
businesses would provide on behalf of government. However, both
statutes and the Constitution prohibit the Administration from
unilaterally withholding funding provided by Congress, and various
legal actions have been brought to stop many of the Administration’s
actions.

These actions will make it harder for the government to effectively
serve people and communities. Households with low and moderate incomes
could be particularly impacted by degraded public services, since they
can’t afford to simply shift from public to private resources to
meet their basic needs, nor do they have the resources to seek legal
recourse when their rights are trampled.

Tariff Plans Are Part of Scheme of Distributing Wealth From Low- and
Moderate-Income Families to the Wealthy

The Administration has proposed and implemented sweeping taxes on
imported goods, known as tariffs, through executive actions,
justifying them in part on the need to raise revenues to offset the
extension of the 2017 tax cuts. Prior to the April 2 announcement of
broad-based tariffs, the Administration imposed a 20 percent tariff on
Chinese imports and a 25 percent tariff on steel, aluminum, car, and
car part imports from across the globe. It also put in place 25
percent tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico, though these
tariffs exempt imports covered under our free trade agreement with
those countries.[20]
[[link removed]]

The most significant tariffs to date were announced on April 2. The
U.S. will now impose at least a 10 percent tax on all imports, and
imports from about 60 additional countries will be taxed at a rate as
high as 50 percent. Trading partners’ imports subject to extra
tariffs include the European Union (20 percent), Japan (24 percent),
South Korea (25 percent), and Vietnam (46 percent). The newly
announced 34 percent tax on Chinese imports will stack on top of the
previously announced 20 percent tax, for a cumulative tax of 54
percent. Imports from Canada and Mexico will be exempt from this
specific tariff. Energy imports will also be exempt as will products
the Trump Administration has imposed or plans to impose specific
global tariffs on such as autos, steel, aluminum, and medicine.

These tariffs are highly significant: they raise the U.S.’s
effective tariff rate — that is the tax rate on all imports — from
2.7 percent to 22.5 percent when combined with the other 2025
tariffs.[21]
[[link removed]] This
is the highest effective tariff rate since 1908, exceeding the
infamous Smoot-Hawley tariffs enacted in 1930.

The revenue from these tariff actions totals $3 trillion over ten
years before accounting for negative macroeconomic effects and
retaliation, according to the Budget Lab at Yale.[22]
[[link removed]] Both
the Administration and congressional Republicans have said that the
projected revenue from tariffs could be an informal offset for the
legislation that will deeply cut taxes for wealthy taxpayers and
corporations.[23]
[[link removed]]

Because the tariffs stem from executive action, they will not be part
of the tax bill and its final Congressional Budget Office and Joint
Committee on Taxation scores. But the Administration could use the
projected revenue to assuage members of Congress’s fears about the
country’s growing deficit as a result of the tax cuts. If the tariff
revenue is being used to justify the reconciliation bill’s fiscal
implications, then it is fair to also include it in the analysis of
the budget agenda’s distributional implications.

These tariffs will increase the prices of a wide range of imported
goods, including products that the United States does not, nor cannot,
produce in large quantities, such as bananas. Indeed, tariffs provide
no protection to domestic producers of goods that compete against
imported goods unless prices on the imported goods rise. A wide array
of analysts including the Congressional Budget Office, the Budget Lab
at Yale, and Goldman Sachs project that sweeping tariffs will result
in an increase in prices that families would experience as a one-time
burst of inflation and then permanently higher price levels for goods,
even after incorporating mitigating effects like adjustments in
exchange rates.[24]
[[link removed]]

Some of the largest price increases U.S. consumers will experience
from this year’s tariffs include clothing (16.9 percent), cars and
car parts (8.4 percent), computers (4.5 percent), and vegetables and
fruits (4.0 percent). Importantly, these estimates are
for _overall_ domestic prices — not just imported goods.[25]
[[link removed]] These
increases will make it more expensive for families to get to work, put
food on the table, and buy new school clothes for their children.

Tariffs can play a useful role in trade policy as a way to remedy
specific trade issues — like the need to ensure domestic production
of goods related to national security — but are a flawed way to
raise revenues because of the burden they place on low- and
moderate-income families. They function similar to a sales tax and
place a heavier immediate burden on families with low and moderate
incomes since they spend a larger share of their income than higher
income families.[26]
[[link removed]]

Moreover, unlike the individual income tax, tariffs do not feature a
progressive rate structure where high-income households by design pay
higher tax rates than low- and moderate-income families. The Treasury
Department finds that families with incomes in the bottom 80 percent
of the income distribution pay 30 percent of tariffs and excise taxes
and 7 percent of individual income taxes.[27]
[[link removed]] The
top 1 percent of households, on the other hand, pay 17 percent of
tariffs and excise taxes and 44 percent of individual income taxes.

But the Republican agenda would make tariffs even more regressive, by
using the revenue raised to help finance regressive tax cuts like
extending the 2017 tax law, which gives low- and moderate-income
families paltry tax cuts and high-income families large tax cuts. We
illustrate how large tariffs can contribute to an extremely regressive
fiscal policy package by adding the Budget Lab analysis of the House
budget to a Budget Lab analysis of the tariffs Trump has enacted this
year.

The combination of tariffs, the cuts to Medicaid and SNAP, and the
extension of the expiring 2017 tax cuts will _reduce_ the incomes of
households with incomes in the bottom 80 percent of the distribution.
The only group that will benefit is households with incomes in the top
20 percent, with those in the top 1 percent receiving a net 2.0
percent increase ($29,630) increase in their incomes. The result for
households with incomes in the bottom 20 percent is especially
striking: they would lose an average of $2,030, or a 9.0 percent
reduction in their income, in service to extending tax cuts for the
wealthy. Overall, households with incomes in the bottom 60 percent
would lose an average of $1,550 in their incomes — the equivalent of
about three months of grocery spending for the average household in
this group.[28]
[[link removed]]

Triple Threat Agenda Will Likely Result in Slower Economic Growth

Tax cuts for the wealthy paid for by cutting programs that help low-
and middle-income families get needed health coverage and afford
groceries, executive actions that undermine services and programs that
communities and households count on, and enormous tariffs that will
cost jobs and raise prices for consumers are going to damage the
economy’s potential for growth.

Extending the 2017 tax cuts will not result in markedly faster
economic growth. In fact, it would shrink the economy in the long run,
a CBO analysis finds.[29]
[[link removed]]

Despite the claims of the tax law’s proponents, the original
legislation did little to spur economic growth during the pre-pandemic
period. Economic growth barely changed in the two years after the law
relative to the two years before the law. The rate of overall business
investment slowed after the tax law’s enactment, as did consumption.
Ironically, real GDP growth rose slightly because of increases in
government spending[30]
[[link removed]] following
passage of the 2018 Bipartisan Budget Act, which boosted defense and
non-defense appropriations funding. (See Figure 4.)

In addition, the tariffs will lead to higher prices, both for consumer
purchases and business investments, ultimately lowering real spending
by consumers and businesses. Given that consumer spending is nearly 70
percent of GDP, and business investment represents another 20 percent,
a major negative shock to this spending is likely to lead to lower
growth. For example, a CBO analysis[31]
[[link removed]] finds
that a combination of a 10 percent tariff on the value of goods from
all countries plus an additional 50 percent tariff on goods imported
from China would decrease real GDP by 0.6 percent. The Budget Lab
analysis of Trump’s 2025 tariffs found similar negative growth
effects.[32]
[[link removed]]

Tariffs — particularly those with an unclear trajectory — also
cause uncertainty in financial markets and make it difficult for
businesses to plan. With the Trump Administration’s haphazard
announcements on tariffs, businesses do not know whether tariffs will
be imposed for a brief period, if there will be exemptions, or whether
the tariff rates will stay constant. This uncertainty lowers
investment spending and thereby decreases economic growth.

This uncertainty has driven consumer and business sentiment indices
downward. The University of Michigan’s Consumer Sentiment fell by
10.5 percent between February and March 2025. The Conference Board’s
consumer confidence measure fell seven points to its lowest reading
since January 2021. Business confidence has fallen, too with the
National Federation of Independent Business small business optimism
index fell 2.1 points between February and March 2025.

The Federal Reserve Board is also factoring this uncertainty into its
economic analysis. The Administration’s agenda led the Fed to revise
down its forecast for economic growth even before the April 2
announcement, while raising its forecast for both unemployment and
inflation. Many economists have expressed concern that the risk of
higher unemployment and economic contraction has risen significantly.

This agenda will not only not boost economic growth but could lead to
a recession. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent called for the economy
to “detox”[33]
[[link removed]] from
public spending. Recessions are not something to take lightly or to
purposely foment. When a recession occurs, people lose jobs,
businesses lose revenue and may end up shuttering, and state and local
finances diminish.

While recessions hit broadly across an economy, specific groups[34]
[[link removed]] tend
to suffer more harm than others, including Black and Hispanic workers,
youth, and those with lower educational attainment. Leisure and
hospitality — the industry with the lowest wages — has been hard
hit in the last few recessions as consumers saved money by pulling
back on discretionary purchases like eating out.[35]
[[link removed]]

And recessions can have long-lasting impacts on households.[36]
[[link removed]] Wage
losses persist after recessions for individuals who graduated in a
recession. New job entrants struggle to progress[37]
[[link removed]] up
the job ladder if they enter the labor market during a recession.
Incomes take longer to recover for those outside of the top 5 percent
of earners. None of this bodes well for the U.S. economy in 2025 and
beyond.

End Notes

[1]
[[link removed]] Chuck
Marr and Samantha Jacoby, “House Republican Budget’s $4.5 Trillion
Tax Cut Doubles Down on Costly Failures of 2017 Tax Law,” CBPP,
February 28,
2025, [link removed]

[2]
[[link removed]] Tax
Policy Center, “T25-0040 – Extend Certain Individual Income Tax
Provisions in the 2017 Tax Act, by ECI Level, 2026,” March 27,
2025, [link removed].

[3]
[[link removed]] Marr
and Jacoby.

[4]
[[link removed]] _Ibid_.

[5]
[[link removed]] United
States House Committee on Ways and Means, “Chairman Smith: A Vote
Against This Budget Is A Vote to Raise Taxes on Low-Income
Americans,” February 25,
2025, [link removed];
Carolyn Gusoff, “SALT cap debate could delay GOP tax bill, New York
Republican says,” CBS News, January 30,
2025, [link removed] .

[6]
[[link removed]] Chuck
Marr, 10:50 a.m., March 12,
2025, [link removed].

[7]
[[link removed]] Sharon
Parrott, “House Budget Would Increase Costs and Hardship for Many
While Providing Huge Tax Breaks for a Wealthy Few,” CBPP, February
25,
2025, [link removed].

[8]
[[link removed]] Office
of Congressman Steve Scalise, “Scalise: Democrats Want
Multi-Trillion Dollar Tax Increase,” February 25,
2025, [link removed].

[9]
[[link removed]] Jacob
Bobage, “GOP must cut Medicaid or Medicare to achieve budget goals,
CBO finds,” Washington Post, March 5,
2025, [link removed];
Bobby Kogan, “The GOP’s budget plan makes it hard to conceal its
lies about Medicaid and SNAP,” March 4,
2025, [link removed].

[10]
[[link removed]] Allison
Orris and Gideon Lukens, “Medicaid Threats in the Upcoming
Congress,” CBPP, December 13,
2024, [link removed];
Katie Bergh, “Millions of Low-Income Households Would Lose Food Aid
Under Proposed House Republican SNAP Cuts,” CBPP, February 24,
2025, [link removed].

[11]
[[link removed]] [link removed]

[12]
[[link removed]] The
Budget Lab analysis does not account for the budget’s cuts to
education or to how the Trump Administration would finance the
budget’s increase to deficits since the enormous cuts to programs
are still not enough to pay for its tax cuts. Brendan Duke, “New
Analysis Quantifies Low- and Moderate-Income Families’ Losses Under
House Budget Resolution,” CBPP, March 19,
2025, [link removed].

[13]
[[link removed]] Burgess
Everett, “Tea party’s champions agonize over spending cuts,”
Semafor, March 27,
2025, [link removed].

[14]
[[link removed]] Paul
N. Van de Water, “SSA Budget Will Worsen Customer Service Crisis,
But Investment in 2025 Could Fund Turnaround,” CBPP, April 12,
2024, [link removed].

[15]
[[link removed]] Lisa
Rein and Hannah Natanson, “Long waits, waves of calls, website
crashes: Social Security is breaking down,” Washington Post, March
25,
2025, [link removed].

[16]
[[link removed]] _Ibid_.

[17]
[[link removed]] Jennifer
Sullivan, “Proposed ACA Marketplace Rule Will Increase Costs, Reduce
Enrollment,”
CBPP, [link removed].

[18]
[[link removed]] David
A. Super, “Many Trump Administration Personnel Actions Are
Unlawful,” CBPP, February 14,
2025, [link removed].

[19]
[[link removed]] The
Budget Lab, “The Revenue and Distributional Effects of IRS
Funding,” March 14,
2025, [link removed].

[20]
[[link removed]] David
Lawder, David Ljunggren, and Kylie Madry, “Trump triggers trade war,
price hikes with tariffs on Canada, China and Mexico,” Reuters,
March 5,
2025, [link removed];
Abha Bhattarai, Mary Beth Sheridan and Amanda Coletta, “Trump grants
one-month tariff reprieve to some goods from Mexico, Canada,”
Washington Post, March 6,
2025, [link removed];
Ana Swanson and Jeanna Smialek, “Trump’s Tariffs on Steel and
Aluminum Go Into Effect, Inciting Global Retaliation,” New York
Times, March 13,
2025, [link removed].

[21]
[[link removed]] The
Budget Lab, “Where We Stand: The Fiscal, Economic, and
Distributional Effects of All U.S. Tariffs Enacted in 2025 Through
April 2,” April 2,
2025, [link removed].

[22]
[[link removed]] _Ibid_.

[23]
[[link removed]] Aime
Williams, “Donald Trump considers two-step tariff regime on April
2,” Financial Times, March 25,
2025, [link removed];
Meredith Lee Hill, “Trump and GOP leaders discuss using tariffs to
pay for agenda,” Politico, February 27,
2025, [link removed].

[24]
[[link removed]] The
Budget Lab, April 2, 2025; Jan Hatzius _et al_., “USA: President
Trump Announces ‘Reciprocal’ Tariffs,” Goldman Sachs, April 2,
2025. On file with author.

[25]
[[link removed]] The
Budget Lab, April 2, 2025.

[26]
[[link removed]] Kimberly
Clausing and Mary E. Lovely, “Why Trump’s tariff proposals would
harm working Americans,” The Peterson Institute for International
Economics, May
2024, [link removed].

[27]
[[link removed]] U.S.
Treasury Department Office of Tax Analysis, “Distribution of Tax
Burden, Current Law
(2025),” [link removed].

[28]
[[link removed]] Analysis
of 2023 Consumer Expenditure Survey data.

[29]
[[link removed]] Congressional
Budget Office, “Projections of Deficits and Debt Under Alternative
Scenarios for the Budget and Interest Rates,” March 21,
2025, [link removed].

[30]
[[link removed]] Jeffrey
R. Campbell _et al_., “The Macroeconomic Effects of the 2018
Bipartisan Budget Act,” Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Economic
Perspectives, Vol. 43, No. 2, July
2019, [link removed].

[31]
[[link removed]] Congressional
Budget Office, “Effects of Illustrative Policies That Would Increase
Tariffs,” December 19, 2024, [link removed].

[32]
[[link removed]] The
Budget Lab, April 2, 2025.

[33]
[[link removed]] David
Lawder and Susan Heavey, “US Treasury’s Bessent says economy may
slow in shift away from public spending,” Reuters, March 7,
2025, [link removed].

[34]
[[link removed]] Hilary
Hoynes _et al_., “Who Suffers during Recessions,” Journal of
Economic Perspectives, Vol. 26, No. 3, Summer
2012, [link removed].

[35]
[[link removed]] U.S.
Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Table B-3. Average hourly and weekly
earnings of all employees on private nonfarm payrolls by industry
sector, seasonally
adjusted,” [link removed]; Eliot
Davila, “Employment in leisure and hospitality departs from
historical trends during 2007–09 recession,” U.S. Bureau of Labor
Statistics Monthly Labor Review, April
2011, [link removed]; Stefania
Albanesi and Jiyeon Kim, “Effects of the COVID-19 Recession on the
US Labor Market: Occupation, Family, and Gender,” Journal of
Economic Perspectives, Vol. 35, No. 3, Summer
2021, [link removed].

[36]
[[link removed]] Heather
Boushey _et al_., “The Damage Done by Recessions and How to
Respond,” May 16, 2019, The Hamilton
Project, [link removed].

[37]
[[link removed]] Kevin
Rinz, “Did Timing Matter? Life Cycle Differences in Effects of
Exposure to the Great Recession,” Journal of Labor Economics, Vol.
40, No. 3, July
2022, [link removed].

BRENDAN DUKE [[link removed]]

Areas of Expertise

Federal Budget [[link removed]]

Federal Tax [[link removed]]

Recent Work:

*
Republican Agenda’s “Triple Threat” to Low- and Moderate-Income
Family Well-Being
[[link removed]]

*
New Analysis Quantifies Low- and Moderate-Income Families’ Losses
Under House Budget Resolution
[[link removed]]

*
CRS: 2017 Tax Law Proponents’ Trickle-Down Claims Haven’t
Materialized
[[link removed]]

Gbenga Ajilore [[link removed]]

Areas of Expertise

Economy [[link removed]]

Recent Work:

*
Republican Agenda’s “Triple Threat” to Low- and Moderate-Income
Family Well-Being
[[link removed]]

*
House Budget Economic Claims Don’t Add Up
[[link removed]]

ABOUT THE CENTER ON BUDGET AND POLICY PRIORITIES

WHO WE ARE

We are a nonpartisan research and policy institute that advances
federal and state policies to help build a nation where everyone —
regardless of income, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender
identity, ZIP code, immigration status, or disability status — has
the resources they need to thrive and share in the nation’s
prosperity.

WHAT WE DO

We combine rigorous research and analysis, strategic communications,
and effective advocacy to shape debates and affect policy, both
nationally and in states.

We work closely with a broad set of national, state, and community
organizations to design and advance policies that promote economic
justice; improve health; broaden opportunity in areas like housing,
health care, employment, and education; and lower structural barriers
for people of color and others in communities that continue to face
systemic barriers to opportunity.

We promote federal and state policies that will build a stronger, more
equitable nation and fair tax policies that can support these gains
over the long term. We also show the harmful impacts of policies and
proposals that would deepen poverty, widen disparities, and worsen
health outcomes.

We work on policy implementation at the federal, state, and local
levels to maximize the positive impact of policies and bring the
lessons learned on the ground back to the policymaking process in
Washington, D.C. and state capitals.

Our work — rooted in sound research and original data analysis,
informed by our extensive knowledge of policy and how programs operate
on the ground, and strengthened by our collaboration with a broad
range of partners — is trusted by a wide range of researchers,
policymakers, and media.

OUR HISTORY

In 1981, Robert Greenstein
[[link removed]] founded the
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) to analyze federal
budget priorities, with a particular focus on how budget choices
affect people with low incomes. In the Center’s early years, we
focused on federal budget and tax issues, nutrition programs, and
income assistance. Our work has broadened considerably over time and
now includes research and advocacy on a wide range of issues including
health care, housing, and the economic and health security of people
who immigrated to the U.S.

Recognizing the critical role that state policy plays in economic and
health security, we began extensive work on state-level policies in
the 1990s. We founded — and continue to coordinate and foster —
the State Priorities Partnership, a network of high-impact policy and
advocacy organizations that now stretches across more than 40 states,
Puerto Rico, and the District of Columbia. Sharing with the Center a
strong emphasis on designing and promoting policies that foster
economic, health, and racial justice, these independent nonprofit
organizations collaborate with a host of partners in their states to
shape policy debates.

OUR IMPACT

Over the last four decades, the Center has played a significant role,
in collaboration with partners around the country, in major advances
in economic and health security policies nationally and in states.

We have helped protect and expand health coverage for millions of
people, extend and expand refundable tax credits that lift millions
above the poverty line, and strengthen nutrition, housing assistance,
and income support to help people afford basic needs. These policies
improve people’s near-term well-being; promote equity across lines
of race, ethnicity, immigration status, and gender; and have long-term
payoffs for them and the country as a whole.

When the Center was founded in 1981, economic security programs lifted
just 20 percent of people who would otherwise be poor above the
poverty line. Prior to the pandemic in 2019, that figure had more than
doubled to 46 percent; economic security programs lifted 34 million
people above the poverty line that year, reducing the poverty rate
from 22.8 percent to 12.2 percent. In 2020, during the pandemic and
its economic fallout, economic security programs and temporary
COVID-19 relief measures increased the number of people kept above the
poverty line substantially to 53 million. Advances in economic
security programs have reduced poverty across racial and ethnic groups
while also narrowing disparities significantly, though large gaps
remain.

Similarly, expansions we helped to drive in Medicaid and the
Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) subsidized coverage through federal and
state marketplaces have changed the landscape of health coverage. In
the early 1980s, Medicaid was small, the Children’s Health Insurance
Program (CHIP) didn’t exist, and most people in low-paid jobs had no
access to affordable coverage unless their employer provided it. Prior
to the pandemic, some 81 million people — 25 percent of the U.S.
population — received coverage through Medicaid, CHIP, or the ACA
marketplaces.

State Priorities Partnership groups have secured important policy
advances across the country. Among other victories, over the past
several years, Partnership groups have helped to raise or protect
roughly $40 billion in state revenue to support a range of
investments, such as in education, health care, and infrastructure;
have contributed to adoption of the ACA’s Medicaid expansion in a
number of states; and have worked toward new or expanded state
refundable tax credits in more than a dozen states, Puerto Rico, and
the District of Columbia, expanding state earned income tax credits by
more than $1 billion and increasing their reach to millions more
households.

The Center is also helping to build the next generation of state
policy leaders through the State Policy Fellowship program
[[link removed]].
This program brings dynamic emerging leaders who know the challenges
faced by communities of color, LGBTQ people, immigrants, tribal
communities, and families with low incomes to Partnership groups and
the Center by offering them two-year paid positions as policy
analysts, as well as other supports, training, and networking
opportunities.

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