Trump's tax law is even better for rich people than originally thought. Here's how much more the top 10% stand to gain.

Yahoo

2 days ago

President Donald Trump's freshly enacted tax and spending law keeps looking better for America's top 10%, according to a new analysis of the bill by nonpartisan congressional scorekeepers.
This top tier stands to gain around $13,600 each year over a decade from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the Congressional Budget Office said Monday. That's up from the CBO's estimates in June, before the bill became law, when researchers at the office projected that the top 10% stood to benefit by around $12,000 annually.
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Republican lawmakers pushed the megabill forward to Trump, who signed it on the Fourth of July.
Middle-class households are also poised to receive some help from the tax cuts, researchers said Monday, and could gain around $800 to $1,200 each year over the next decade. That's higher than the CBO's June estimate of $500 to $1,000.
One projection that hasn't changed between the CBO's new assessment of the law's winners and losers and its initial look in June: The poorest Americans will lose money under the bill due to a thinner social safety net. That's still the case, though the latest estimate suggests a slightly more moderate impact: The lowest 10% of households by income would see their financial resources decrease by $1,200 per year, CBO researchers said Monday. That's compared with a $1,600 yearly financial hit estimated in June.
The top 10% of households have average 'market incomes' — which include wages and capital gains — of around $700,000, CBO numbers show. The lowest 10% have market incomes averaging nearly $24,000.
The legislation includes spending cuts and tighter eligibility requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps, and Medicaid, the federal program administered by states providing health insurance to low-income people.
The number of uninsured people in the country will grow by approximately 10 million over a decade, and 7.5 million of those people will lose coverage as a result of tighter Medicaid eligibility rules. Republicans have said the cuts are needed to address waste, fraud and abuse in the system, while opponents argue the cuts go too far and will wrongly kick eligible people off their insurance.
The CBO acknowledged its latest estimates for health-insurance coverage as a result of the new law are 'subject to considerable uncertainty.'
The bill is letting an enhancement to the premium tax credit expire at the end of the year. The credit is designed to defray a person's healthcare costs when they buy insurance through the Affordable Care Act's exchanges. Some of the earliest health-insurance price jumps could appear this fall, when carriers release their 2026 premiums.
Read also: Costs could soar next year for people with Obamacare. What you can do about it now.
The law made permanent the income-tax rates set in Trump's first administration. It boosted the child tax credit and standard deduction, both widely used by families. It also added new temporary tax breaks, like deductions for tips and overtime pay, along with a $6,000 deduction for senior citizens.
Republicans point to provisions like these when touting the bill's wins for everyday Americans.
The law also kept the multimillion-dollar estate-tax exemption from shrinking, while codifying expense and research write-offs for businesses. It also temporarily quadrupled the state and local tax deduction to $40,000, an amount that will gradually increase through 2029 before reverting to $10,000 in 2030.
Critics say rich taxpayers in high-cost states benefit most from the SALT cap. The write-off is capped at $250,000 for single filers or $500,000 for married couples filing jointly.
The White House and Republican lawmakers have sharply criticized CBO estimates of the bill's impact, saying they lowball economic-growth projections.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
But the numbers may stoke public skepticism at a time when Republicans are trying to tout the law's benefits. Almost two-thirds of people said the bill would help wealthy people, according to an AP-NORC poll released last month. Six in 10 people said it will hurt low-income people, while 51% said it would benefit the middle class.
Trump's tax law is even better for rich people than originally thought. Here's how much more the top 10% stand to gain.
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