XPost: alt.politics.economics, talk.politics.guns, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh
XPost: sac.politics, misc.taxes

https://fortune.com/2025/08/12/trump-tariffs-revenue-crfb/

President Donald Trump’s sweeping new tariffs are raking in
unprecedented sums for the federal government—so much, in fact, that a
top budget watchdog says the revenue rivals the impact of creating a
brand-new payroll tax or slashing the entire military budget by nearly one-fifth. (These are rough estimates, to be sure, conveyed to
communicate the magnitude of the tariffs, not precise contributions to
the budget.) But can these massive cash flows, already topping tens of
billions monthly, truly put a dent in America’s $37 trillion national
debt?

Actually, yes, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal
Budget (CRFB), which alternately calls the revenue being generated by
the tariffs to be “meaningful” and “significant.”

Since his return to the White House, Trump has unleashed a wave of
“reciprocal tariffs” on almost every major U.S. trading partner. Roughly
$25 billion was collected in July, the CRFB calculated, more than triple
the amount from late last year, and surely a fraction of what
forthcoming months will yield. The D.C.-based think tank estimates the
tariffs will bring in an estimated $1.3 trillion of net new revenue
through the end of Trump’s current term and $2.8 trillion through 2034.
That represents a $600 billion leap forward from the tariffs in effect
as of May.

For context, in fiscal 2025 so far, tariffs have accounted for 2.7% of
all federal revenue—more than double typical levels. Some analysts
project that figure climbing as high as 5% if current policies remain in
place.

Impact on the national debt
In theory, pouring $2.8 trillion from tariffs into the national coffers
could markedly slow the growth of the federal debt. Congressional Budget
Office figures and CRFB models suggest that, if kept permanent, Trump’s
tariff regime could reduce the deficit by up to $2.8 trillion in the
next decade. “The recent tariff increases are likely to meaningfully
reduce deficits if allowed to remain in effect or replaced on a pay-as-you-go…basis,” the CRFB wrote in its analysis.

Experts still caution the impact, though real, remains limited when
compared to the sheer scale of the U.S. government’s finances: a
whopping $37 trillion. Even with historic tariff gains, these revenues represent only a fraction of total federal income—nowhere near enough to replace income taxes or close the debt gap. In fact, during fiscal year
2025, income taxes and payroll taxes covered over three-quarters of
federal revenue.

Then there’s the question of who is really paying the price, or as Trump
likes to put it, who is eating the tariffs. The government is getting
revenue from whom, exactly?

Eating the tariffs
While Washington enjoys a flood of new revenue, the reality on the
ground is more complex. Businesses typically pass the cost of tariffs
through to consumers in the form of higher prices. Economic research
shows the new tariffs function much like a regressive tax, hitting
lower- and middle-income households particularly hard. The average
family in the second-lowest income tier faced an annual cost increase of $1,700; those in the top income decile paid upwards of $8,100 more per
year, according to Yale Budget Lab.

Moreover, defense and infrastructure experts warn rising costs from
tariffs may invite higher prices for critical hardware and components
needed by the military and national security agencies. Tariffs “make it
more expensive to meet national defense requirements,” the Council on
Foreign Relations wrote in early July.

Trump floats ‘tariff dividend checks’—but debt likely to grow
President Trump has floated the idea of distributing “tariff dividend
checks” to American families on top of debt-reduction promises. But most economists say the math doesn’t quite add up: While the government is
enjoying record-breaking revenues, those gains are still dwarfed by
annual spending and existing commitments. Even under the most optimistic scenarios from the Trump administration and its budget watchdogs,
tariffs will only slow—not reverse—the upward march of the national
debt.

The CRFB is a respected nonpartisan institution that dates back to 1981,
with a board consistently made up of former members and directors of key budgetary, fiscal, and policy institutions, such as the Congressional
Budget Office, the House and Senate Budget Committees, the Office of
Management and Budget, and the Federal Reserve. The CRFB regularly
produces analyses of government spending and debt and deficit trends, as
well as the solvency of programs such as Social Security.

The CRFB regularly advocated for reducing federal deficits and
controlling the growth of national debt. It typically favors reforms to
federal “entitlement” programs and functions as a deficit hawk, which
draws the ire of left-wing figures. For instance, Paul Krugman
characterized it as a “deficit scold” while he was still with the New
York Times.


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November 5, 2024 - Congratulations President Donald Trump. We look
forward to America being great again.

We live in a time where intelligent people are being silenced so that
stupid people won't be offended.

Every day is an IQ test. Some pass, some, not so much.

Thank you for cleaning up the disasters of the 2008-2017, 2020-2024 Obama
/ Biden / Harris fiascos, President Trump.

Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
queer liberal democrat donors.

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