Latest news with #JasonFurman
Yahoo
11-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Trump Made A Massive Campaign Promise That He Did Not Keep, And Now He's Pretending He Actually Did
WASHINGTON — Donald Trump failed to deliver on his promise to end taxes on Social Security benefits, overtime, and tip income, and so now has turned to an alternative that has often worked for him in the past: lying about it. Related: Ever since his massive tax and spending bill cleared the Senate last weekend, Trump has been claiming that it fulfills campaign pledges that helped him return to the presidency, even though the 330-page measure only provides temporary help that only partially accomplishes what he promised. What's more, the recipients of those tax breaks, along with every other American household, could soon end up paying far more because of the massive import taxes Trump says will take effect next month. 'It's about $750 in tax cuts and $2,000 in tariff increases,' said Jason Furman, a top economist in Barack Obama's White House, about the effects on the typical household. White House aides did not respond to HuffPost queries about why Trump was lying about the new law and why he did not push to make those provisions that help middle-class Americans permanent, as he did the tax rate changes that disproportionately benefit the wealthiest. Related: Trump himself, meanwhile, has been claiming, falsely and unequivocally, that he has made good on his oft-repeated promises in 2024 as he ran to regain the office he had lost in 2020 after bungling the nation's response to the coronavirus pandemic. 'There's no tax on tips, no tax on Social Security, no tax on overtime,' he told Fox News on June 29. In Tuesday's Cabinet meeting photo opportunity, he again claimed that he and congressional Republicans had delivered 'no tax on tips, no tax on Social Security, no tax on overtime.' And on Wednesday, in an email to his small-dollar donors, Trump wrote: 'I just signed into LAW something I'm very proud of: NO TAXES ON SOCIAL SECURITY!' Related: In reality, Trump and Republicans created a limited tax deduction for a maximum of $12,500 in overtime pay and $25,000 in tip income, and only for federal income tax. Workers will still have to pay Social Security and Medicare taxes on all overtime pay and tips. The situation is similar for senior citizens whom Trump promised, repeatedly, that he would stop taxing Social Security payments. Instead, they will receive a new tax deduction amounting to about $600 for the typical recipient not already exempt from paying that tax because their total income was too low. And all three tax breaks will expire in 2028 – the year Trump leaves office, assuming he chooses to honor the constitutional limit of two presidential terms. Related: Congressional Republicans, meanwhile, are also claiming they have successfully delivered on Trump's promises while bragging more broadly about making permanent the 2017 tax cuts that otherwise would have expired. Ohio Sen. Bernie Moreno, a Trump ally who won his seat thanks to Trump's endorsement, tried to draw a contrast between the tax priorities of President Joe Biden's administration, which encouraged alternative energy, and Trump and Republicans now. In a social media post on Tuesday, Moreno claimed that while Democrats created a $7,500 tax credit for buying an electric vehicle, Trump and Republicans were providing $7,500 to typical families. The claim, however, falsely suggests that the $2,200 per child tax credit is brand new — rather than a $200 increase over the existing one — and conflates a tax credit with a tax deduction, which is worth considerably less. In reality, the total value of the tax breaks Moreno cites in his example is only $1,916 — one-fourth of what he claimed in his post. Moreno's aides declined to comment for this story. Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin said the tariffs, tax cut extensions skewed to favor the wealthiest Americans, and cuts to Medicaid and food stamps in the bill reveal Trump's true priorities. 'On Day One, he promised to lower costs but instead he passed the largest cuts to health care and food assistance in American history and has dragged the American people into a chaotic trade war with no end in sight,' Martin said. 'The bottom line: Trump is a crooked liar and a con artist rigging the economy for the ultra-wealthy.'This article originally appeared on HuffPost. Also in In the News: Also in In the News: Also in In the News:
CNBC
09-07-2025
- Politics
- CNBC
'Big beautiful bill' concerns are the dramatic cuts to Medicaid, social safety net: Harvard's Furman
Jason Furman, Harvard professor and former CEA chair, and Kevin Brady, former Chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, joins 'Squawk Box' to discuss the tax impact of the budget bill, any issues with Medicaid and much more.
New York Times
08-07-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Trump's Big Bill Is Now Law. What Was Learned?
To the Editor: Re 'Three Lessons From the Big, Awful Bill,' by Jason Furman (Opinion guest essay, July 7): I'm afraid that Professor Furman drew the wrong lessons from this bill. Its passage had nothing to do with the quality of ideas, experts or even economics. It was all about greed (for power and money) and fear (of President Trump). The legislators' constituents or the fate of the country meant nothing in the face of the Big, Awful Tyrant in the White House. Susan BodikerWashington To the Editor: Jason Furman is wrong to think that the way the Republicans brought us the worst piece of legislation in modern times holds a lesson for Democrats. It's easy to put together legislation that enriches the rich, brings cruelty to the vulnerable and is fiscally irresponsible. It's what Trump supporters do. It's much harder to craft legislation that helps bring about economic growth that can be widely shared among all Americans and do good for the world. The lesson here is more simple: Whatever debates Democrats are having between more centrist and progressive elements pales in comparison to the damage we do when we don't get out the vote to prevent Republicans from taking power. Richard DineSilver Spring, Md. To the Editor: Maybe there's only one lesson from President Trump's hugely horrific bill: Legislating works very differently when there is a large dose of authoritarianism in the body politic. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Mint
28-06-2025
- Business
- Mint
US economy shrugs off trade war and soldiers on
President Trump is still issuing tariff threats, consumer spending is weakening, and the Mideast is in turmoil. So why did the S&P 500 hit a record high Friday? Investors may not think the economy is taking off, but they are probably relieved that the worst-case scenarios feared in recent months haven't come to pass. Trump's tariffs, deportations, and cuts to the federal bureaucracy have bent the economy but haven't broken it. The S&P 500 plummeted 19% from its previous high in February to its 2025 low on April 8. Behind the drop: fears that Trump's threatened tariffs of as high as 145% on China and 50% on other major trading partners would send inflation and interest rates up, sap business and consumer confidence, and spark a recession. Instead, Trump has significantly dialed back the tariffs from what he first proposed. Although tariffs did come into effect starting in February on China, Canada and Mexico, as well as on autos, steel and aluminum, the effect on inflation to date has been milder than feared. Oil prices leapt when Israel attacked Iran and the U.S. joined in, but have since fallen back. Even after President Trump's rollbacks, the average tariff in the U.S. is 18.8%, the highest since the 1930s. Economists at JPMorgan Chase put the probability of recession starting in the next four quarters at about one-third, down from 60% in early April. In recent months, business confidence fell amid tariff threats. Yet that sentiment never fully translated into behavior: businesses kept investing in equipment, factories and technology. They kept adding jobs, albeit at a slower pace than last year. 'The macro economy is doing decently," said Jason Furman, a Harvard economics professor who was an adviser to President Barack Obama. Especially when it comes to tariffs, the market is now more confident 'that Trump will back off if necessary," he added. 'In April I think the fear was he would just plow ahead no matter what. Now there is a sense that there are realities he won't try to blow past." Consumer confidence has also recovered a bit. The University of Michigan's consumer sentiment index rose 16% in June from May, though it remains 18% lower than in December. Wall Street analysts expect earnings at retailers and other S&P 500 consumer discretionary companies to fall in the second quarter from a year earlier. Earlier this year, 'consumers were really on a downward trend, they really were worried that the high levels of tariffs threatened and policy volatility could lead to very dire consequences," said Joanne Hsu, director of consumer surveys for the University of Michigan. Now, 'consumers don't think we're out of the woods, but they're less worried about the worst-case scenario.' Still, while consumer spending never collapsed, new data shows that it has weakened significantly. The labor market also appears to be softening. Annualized growth in gross domestic product is likely to average 0.8% over the first two quarters of 2025, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence, down sharply from 2.5% in 2024. The stock market isn't the economy, but it does capture in real time how investors feel about growth, profits, interest rates, and risk. While companies were cautious about the outlook a few months ago, their recent profit guidance has tended to be better than analysts expected, according to FactSet. The policy landscape has also become less unpredictable, easing investors' fears. Republicans' massive tax and spending bill remains up in the air, but that sort of risk is more familiar than the tariffs and steep cuts to the federal bureaucracy by Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency that regularly emanated from the White House in previous months. 'If you look at the beginning of the year, the main action economically was tariffs and DOGE, and both of those were very dramatic, very fast and of debated lawfulness," Furman said. 'Now the main thing going on is this fiscal bill, which I think is problematic. But it's sort of normal…things have moved more into the legislative arena, which is weirdly more predictable." In a recently released report, the White House Council of Economic Advisers predicted the Senate draft of Trump's 'one big beautiful bill" will significantly boost investment, wages and employment in the next four years relative to a scenario in which the 2017 tax cuts expire this year, as scheduled. This past week, Fed chairman Jerome Powell acknowledged there has been little evidence of tariffs pushing up inflation broadly thus far, and some Fed officials have said a rate cut should be on the table as soon as next month. That has caused some bond yields to drop, which is also good for the stock market. Still, tariffs' full effect could still lie ahead. A 90-day pause on Trump's steepest tariffs is to end July 9. Officials have said that deadline could slip as the U.S. and some partners close in on deals. But Friday, Trump said he had broken off talks with Canada and would issue new tariffs soon, and the administration is also carrying out probes that could yield new tariffs on semiconductors and pharmaceuticals. Trump's tariff threats spurred car sales earlier this year. Even after Trump's rollbacks, the average tariff in the U.S. is 18.8%, the highest since the 1930s, versus 2.4% in 2024, according to Preston Caldwell, chief U.S. economist at Morningstar. He thinks that will push inflation based on the index of personal-consumption expenditures to 3.2% in early 2026, versus 2.3% now. The biggest risk to the outlook appears to be the consumer. This past week, the Commerce Department sharply revised down consumption growth. That softness has persisted in the second quarter, with inflation-adjusted consumption slipping 0.3% in May from April, leaving the level of spending below December's. Particularly notable was softness in discretionary categories including air travel and hotels, which are especially sensitive to moods about the economy. Wall Street analysts now expect earnings at S&P 500 consumer discretionary companies, which includes retailers, restaurant chains and carmakers, to slip by 5.1% in the second quarter from a year earlier, according to FactSet, down from a 2.2% gain at the end of March. Write to Jeanne Whalen at Justin Lahart at and Te-Ping Chen at
CNBC
10-06-2025
- Business
- CNBC
I believe economic hard data over the soft data right now, says fmr. CEA Chair Jason Furman
Jason Furman, former CEA Chair & Harvard Professor, joins 'Closing Bell Overtime' to talk the state of the U.S. economy, upcoming inflation data, and more.
