Donald Trump inherited an economy with genuinely mixed conditions in January 2025: unemployment at 4.1% and inflation down to 2.9% from a 2022 peak of 9.1%, set against record housing prices, a 6.96% mortgage rate, structural deficits and a well-funded military that GAO says has been losing readiness for two decades. The more precise criticism of what followed isn’t that he wrecked a good economy; it’s that Public Law 119-21, the reconciliation law he signed on July 4, 2025, made a documented distributional choice. CBO found the law increases household resources through taxes and cash transfers by $3.3 trillion over 2026 to 2034 while cutting in-kind benefits, mostly Medicaid and SNAP, by $900 billion, producing a projected 3.1% resource loss for the bottom income decile and a 2.7% gain for the top by 2034, along with 10 million more uninsured people and a $4.1 trillion deficit increase including interest.
View More The Economy He Inherited, and the One He Legislated
