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All our enemies seem to think he's weakening the USA but he's stupid and
the slaves who voted for him are also too stupid to understand the damage
he's doing. Thank God and Jesus Christ that Trump, 79, is in poor health
so the next parade will be his own funeral.
I look forward to his death and so do millions of real American patriots.
THE GREAT DISMANTLING
Making america backward again
President or Mad King?
How Donald Trump and MAGAnomics
are destroying the economy and waging war
on the middle class and the poor
By PAUL KRUGMAN
If you werent deeply afraid months ago of what a second Trump
administration would mean, you werent paying attention. The attack on
democracy and rule of law the transformation of the land of the free into
a nation where masked government agents kidnap people on
the streets and opposition to the Leader is criminalized was completely predictable.
Even those who knew that bad things were coming, however, have been
startled by the damage MAGA has done to our strengths the speed, if you
like, with which it has undermined American greatness. It was obvious that Donald Trump and Co. would pursue some bad economic policies, but few
expected them to create a full-blown crisis in a matter of months. It was obvious that Trumps allies would degrade governance, but not that they
would rapidly bring the whole apparatus of government to the point of
collapse. It was predictable that MAGA would go after inconvenient research like the study of climate change, but not that it would move so decisively
to destroy American science and intellectual endeavor in general.
And much of the damage will be permanent. Even if MAGA is eventually driven from power and its policies are reversed, we may never go back to being the nation we were just a few months ago.
Lets start with a brief portrait of who we used to be.
The America That Was
America at the end of the Biden years was in a sour mood, mostly because
people were still angry about the surge in consumer prices as the economy recovered from Covid. Neither the bout of inflation nor the bad feelings,
by the way, were unique to the United States. For example, the cumulative
rise in consumer prices between the eve of Covid and January 2025 was
almost exactly the same in the European Union as it was in the U. S. ,
while, as the financial journalist John Burn-Murdoch has said, 2024
elections were a graveyard of incumbents almost everywhere. (Canadas
Liberal Party was set to join that graveyard with a historic defeat until Trump came to its rescue. )
But if you look past the bad vibes, America at the beginning of this year
was in good shape in many ways. Prices rose a lot between 2021 and 2023,
but most workers wages had outpaced inflation since the start of the
pandemic, while the rate of inflation the change in prices over the past
year had fallen dramatically from its peak in 2022. Furthermore,
disinflation took place without the extended period of high unemployment
many economists had said would accompany it.
Taking a longer perspective, the performance of the U. S. economy in the
21st century had made it, as The Economist put it, the envy of the world. Productivity and per capita income had grown much faster than in any other wealthy nation, with leading voices in Europe like Mario Draghi, the former president of the European Central Bank, calling for urgent efforts to
narrow the growing dominance of U. S. companies in advanced technology, a
gap that many attributed to inadequate investment, a lack of entrepreneurs willing to take risks, and the absence of high-tech clusters comparable to Silicon Valley.
Part of that technology gap also probably had to do with the dominance of
U. S. science and our superb system of higher education.
Many non-economic indicators were looking good, too. Right-wingers liked to portray a nation terrorized by immigrant crime, but the reality is that the Covid bump in crime rates quickly receded, and by 2024, Americas homicide
rate was near its lowest level over the past 65 years. New York had 2,262 murders in 1990; it had only 382 in 2024.
Not everything was going well. Income inequality declined somewhat during
the Biden years, with bigger wage gains at the bottom than at the top, but remained extreme. Deaths of despair, that is, deaths from suicide, alcohol abuse, and especially opioids remained high. And one way in which America
has performed poorly compared with our peers was our low and lagging life expectancy. If you look at a map of the electorate, low life expectancy and high mortality show an obvious correlation with low rates of employment
among men and large majorities for Trump.
All in all, however, Trump took power in a nation that, despite its dark
mood, was doing well on many fronts. But he has moved quickly to fix that. MAGAnomics
While many voters expected Trump to bring back the prosperity over which he presided during most of his first term (whether or not he caused it), most economists who looked at his platform during the 2024 campaign gave it poor reviews. Three things in particular looked disturbing.
First, Trump proposed large increases in tariff rates much bigger than anything he did during his first term. These tariffs, according to basic economics, would cause inflation and reduce real incomes.
Second, he called for large-scale deportations, which would be highly disruptive for industries, like agriculture and construction, that are
highly dependent on foreign-born workers, some of them undocumented.
Finally, he made it clear that he wanted to politicize the Federal Reserve,
the institution that both fights recessions and tries to keep inflation
under control.
All of this chaos is on Trumps head: The economy would be doing fine if he
had left it alone.
The deportations weve seen so far have been brutal and illegal, but havent
yet involved large numbers of workers. Trump has raged a lot against Jerome Powell, the Feds chairman, but hasnt yet tried to take control. So these
are still potential rather than ongoing threats to the economy.
But the tariffs are here, belying the belief of many business supporters of Trump that he wouldnt go through with everything he talked about during the campaign. In practice, the Trump tariffs have been more extreme and, well, crazier than anything he suggested back then.
I do mean extreme. America had fairly free trade, with an average rate of
2.4 percent, when Trump took office. Trump, however, imposed huge tariffs. Imports from China temporarily faced a tariff of 145 percent! That rate has been provisionally reduced to 30 percent, but even after that climbdown,
the average tariff rate was 17.4 percent the highest level of tariffs
since 1934, not much lower than the rate after the infamous Smoot-Hawley
tariff of 1930.
All indications are that these tariffs will do large economic damage, much larger than pre-inauguration analyses predicted. Why will the damage be so severe?
For one thing, theres a big difference between imposing 10 or 25 percent tariffs on a few imports and imposing 10 percent on everything and 30
percent on everything one of our major suppliers of both consumer goods and industrial imports produces. As I write this, West Coast ports are
reporting a sharp drop in ships arriving from Asia; in fact, the latest
report says that no container ships are departing China for America right
now.
The results of this collapse in trade could probably show up in a few
weeks, as inventories are exhausted. Well soon see soaring prices, quite possibly empty shelves, and widespread layoffs even bankruptcies among businesses that depended on the flow of goods from abroad, including
trucking companies, retailers, and quite a few manufacturers.
US President Donald Trump delivers remarks on reciprocal tariffs as US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick holds a chart during an event in the
Rose Garden entitled "Make America Wealthy Again" at the White House in Washington, DC, on April 2, 2025. Trump geared up to unveil sweeping new "Liberation Day" tariffs in a move that threatens to ignite a devastating global trade war. Key US trading partners including the European Union and Britain said they were preparing their responses to Trump's escalation, as nervous markets fell in Europe and America. (Photo by Brendan SMIALOWSKI /
AFP) (Photo by BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images)
Liberation Day, when Trump declared worldwide tariffs, including islands inhabited only by penguins.
BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/getty images
Adding to this direct impact of tariffs is the huge uncertainty Trumps
tariff policy has created. If youve been following the story so far, you
know that on April 2 insanely dubbed Liberation Day by the president
Trump imposed huge tariffs on countries and territories around the world, including islands inhabited only by penguins. Then a week later, he put
those tariffs on a 90-day pause, replacing them with a new set of tariffs
that were equally extreme on average but quite different in detail.
According to press reports, the big change came when two Trump Cabinet
members managed to corner him in his office while his trade czar was in
another meeting.
So who knows what tariff rates will be, say, six months or a year from now?
And how are businesses supposed to plan in the face of such instability? If youre a company deciding whether to invest in, say, a factory in Mexico or
a factory in the United States, you know that either investment could
easily turn out to be a waste of money. A Mexican factory will be worthless
if Trump keeps 25 percent tariffs in place; a higher-cost U. S. facility
will be worthless if he decides to take the tariffs off.
Its worth noting that Trumps tariffs violate all of our existing
international trade agreements and have run into opposition in the courts.
One of the main purposes of such agreements is precisely to help make
future policy predictable. Now, we have a U. S. government that treats
solemn compacts with other countries as worthless pieces of paper.
In this environment, the rational thing for many businesses and many consumers, too is to sit on their hands, accumulating cash rather than
making investments.
The result is that were facing a substantial risk of stagflation rising
prices and shortages because tariffs have cut off imports, and rising unemployment because erratic policy is deterring spending. And all of this chaos is on Trumps head: The economy would be doing fine if he had left it alone.
Demolishing Government, Waging War on the Poor
Although the news media keep calling Trump a populist, it was clear before
he regained power that his administration would follow a right-wing fiscal agenda: big tax cuts for the rich, savage benefit cuts for the poor and
working class.
Even so, the budget bill that passed the House in May has been incredibly extreme. According to the Congressional Budget Office, it cuts almost $700 billion from Medicaid, which will deny health care to millions we may be talking about 15 million or more people losing insurance by the time this budget and other Trump policies go into effect. The budget also cuts close
to $300 billion from SNAP, a. k. a. food stamps, which means that many Americans will go hungry.
These cuts to social programs will, the CBO estimates, reduce the
purchasing power of lower-income U. S. households by around four percent;
some independent estimates are even bigger. And Trumps tariffs will also
weigh heavily on working families, which will be hit hard by higher prices
for clothing, food, and other essentials. Its a good guess that Americans
in the bottom 10 or 20 percent of income distribution, who are already struggling, could find themselves on average seven percent or more worse
off, with many suffering even more than that.
The dollars value has plunged, suggesting that investors are losing faith
in U. S. credibility.
Yet despite these savage cuts at the bottom, taxes at the top are cut so
much that the CBO estimates the budget will add $3.8 trillion to the
deficit.
If you dont believe the CBOs dismal deficit forecast, look at the bond
market: Long-term interest rates on U. S. debt have soared to levels not
seen in many years, while the dollars value against foreign currencies has plunged, suggesting that investors are losing faith in U. S. credibility,
maybe even solvency.
Beyond the viciousness and irresponsibility of its budget, the Trump administration has been destroying the ability of the government to carry
out its most basic functions.
When Trump created Elon Musks so-called Department of Government
Efficiency, it was obvious that DOGE couldnt possibly deliver the huge cost savings Musk was promising. Of course theres waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal government, as there is in any large organization, but the great
bulk of federal spending goes either to the social safety net or the
military, and there was no reason to believe the Muskenjugend the young
tech bros Musk was parachuting into agencies they didnt understand could
save significant sums without creating chaos.
The skeptics were right. DOGEs receipts, listing purported savings, have itemized only a tiny fraction of the sums Musk claimed he would deliver
and theyre riddled with accounting errors. If DOGE has managed to cut
overall spending at all, the amount has been too small to show up in budget data.
DOGE has, however, created a lot of chaos. Stories keep surfacing of sudden dismissals of government workers who turn out to fulfill crucial functions, followed by desperate attempts to hire them back. Agencies the public
depends on, like Social Security, are fraying at the seams, with more and
more tales of beneficiaries missing their checks, then finding it nearly impossible to get help.
The monetary hit many Americans are about to take is one thing, but if you
ask me, the psychological damage of this sabotage will go beyond the loss
of money. Even if seniors, veterans, and others who depend on government
aid eventually get what theyve been promised, many will go through long
periods of panic and frustration because theyll never know when or if
theyll be helped.
Moreover, the federal government isnt a bloated, pointless bureaucracy. It
is, instead, largely staffed by millions of good people who care about
their jobs often working for much lower salaries than they could make in
the private sector. Subjecting them to arbitrary firings and treating them
with contempt amounts to destroying a valuable public asset.
As with Trumps tariffs, much of this damage will be irreversible. Even if
DOGE is eventually shut down and the tech bros sent home in disgrace, how
many of the dedicated civil servants weve lost will come back? How many
young people will be willing to enter government service, knowing what
happened to their predecessors?
The pretty good federal government we had just four months ago has been degraded, and it may take decades to restore it.
The War on Knowledge
America leads the world in science and intellectual inquiry of all kinds.
Or it did a few months ago. Its hard to overstate the devastation Trump has wrought since then.
I dont know how many people realize the extent to which the Trump administration has already brought scientific research in America to a screeching halt. The 2026 budget proposal released by the administration
would cut funding for the National Institutes of Health by 40 percent and funding for the National Science Foundation by more than half.
We may see 15 million or more people losing insurance by the time this
budget goes into effect.
But support for research has already dried up well in advance of the next fiscal year. On April 30, NSF staffers were instructed to stop awarding all funding actions until further notice. This doesnt just mean no new grants,
it means no disbursement of increments of money on existing grants. Worse,
the NIH appears to be ghosting grantees not formally canceling their
grants but simply failing to send the promised funds.
Nor is the war on science just about money. Everywhere you look theres a
push to shut down any research that MAGA types think is woke or touches on
DEI. This doesnt have to mean, say, gender studies. It could mean any study that might provide evidence for climate change or suggest that vaccines
work and dont cause autism. This is a frontal assault on intellectual
inquiry of any kind.
Here, too much of the damage is likely to be permanent. Even if a future administration were to restore funding and end the campaign against
perceived wokeness, who will want to begin a major research project in a
nation that behaves this way? How many leading scientists or talented
foreign students will want to accept positions at U. S. universities
knowing that theyre one election away from persecution, maybe even arrest?
As far as science is concerned, the American century may well be over.
Cryptos New Gilded Age
One of the more surprising developments deserves mention: the Trumpian
boosting and exploitation of cryptocurrency. It may seem hard to believe,
but Bitcoin is an elderly idea as informational technologies go: It was
created in 2008, which makes it almost as old as the iPhone. In all the
years since, the vast legions of cryptocurrency salesmen have failed to
find any real economic role for their products. Most legitimate businesses
dont accept payment in crypto, even in countries like El Salvador that have spent large sums trying to promote the digital currency.
But illegitimate business, where being able to transfer large sums that
legal authorities cant track, is another matter. Cryptocurrencies,
especially stablecoins like Tether, have come to play a huge role in
criminal activity, especially in blackmail and extortion.
Now, crypto has found an even more remarkable use: bribery, with useless
$TRUMP and $MELANIA coins being used to transfer billions to the president
and his family, likely in return for influence. The president even threw a party for crypto enthusiasts, charging them $1 million for the pleasure of
his company. It all makes the corruption of the Gilded Age look petty and quaint.
The Triumph of Resentment
The obvious question, given this landscape of devastation, is one of
motive. Why are Trump and those around him doing this?
Quite a few people on the U. S. left and even the center-left hold the
Bernie Sanders view: What were seeing is government by and for oligarchs.
That is, were looking at a cabal of billionaires who want to get even
richer. They want to slash government spending, especially spending that
helps the vulnerable, to make room for tax cuts. They want to dismantle government so it can be privatized, with contracts going to them and their friends.
Theres clearly something to that. But I dont think thats the whole story.
It doesnt explain the trade war, which hurts almost everyone. It doesnt
explain why these people want to make infectious disease great again and destroy American science.
What I think is happening is the triumph of resentment. Try reading Trumps Truth Social posts, or Musks tweets, or RFK Jr. s speeches, and the overwhelming impression you get is that these are angry, insecure people. Perhaps Harvard should lose its Tax Exempt Status and be Taxed as a
Political Entity if it keeps pushing political, ideological, and terrorist inspired/supporting Sickness? Trump said on Truth Social. Does this sound
like a rational policymaker? Or like someone with a grudge?
These men clearly arent suffering from economic anxiety. Theyre wealthy and hold positions of great power, and are likely enriching themselves through
epic corruption as we speak. Yet anyone whos spent time around men in privileged positions knows how easy it is for some of them to feel bitter
and angry, despite lives 99.9 percent of the population would envy, because privilege isnt as fulfilling as they thought it would be. (Hey, Ive spent
much of my life around elite academics, and I see it all the time. )
The common feature of MAGAs leading figures is that they appear to feel
that they have, as Trump would put it, been treated very badly. Trump
senses that many people consider him an ignorant boor, and it drives him
crazy. Musk is furious that he no longer receives the admiration he did
when Tesla was cool. RFK Jr. seems determined to prove that he isnt the
crank he is.
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I would argue that almost all of the administrations policies have been
shaped by this resentment. Trump is going wild on tariffs in large part to
get back at economists who think they know how these things work better
than a real-estate developer who doesnt read much. Musk wrecked the federal government to prove that he really is a genius who understands everything better than anyone else. RFK is destroying medical research to silence
anyone who might contradict his snake oil.
Obviously theres something deeply wrong with a body politic that could put
such people in power. I do, however, have enough faith in America to
believe that their reign will eventually end. In the meantime, however,
theyre doing incredible damage. And I dont expect to see a full recovery in
my lifetime.
PAUL KRUGMAN is a Nobel Prize-winning economist, the author of many books,
and a former New York Times columnist. Follow him on Substack at
paulkrugman. substack. com.
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