Trump budget plan would cost low-income people $1,600 a year, boost wealthy
The measure branded as the Big Beautiful Bill would harm the poor by imposing draconian cuts on social programs they rely on like Medicaid and food assistance while handing a windfall to the wealthy mostly by extending generous Trump tax cuts.
President Trump’s sprawling budget plan would cost low-income Americans $1,600 a year while boosting wealthy households by $16,000, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated Thursday.
The measure branded as the Big Beautiful Bill would harm the poor by imposing draconian cuts on social programs they rely on like food assistance and Medicaid, which provides health coverage to low-income and disabled people.
It would hand a windfall to the wealthy mostly by extending generous Trump tax cuts, which disproportionately benefit those at the upper end of the economic ladder.
Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pennsylvania) called the bill, which Republicans are seeking to push through the Senate, “one of the largest transfers of wealth from working families to the ultra-rich in American history.”
“It’s shameful,” said Boyle, the ranking Democrat on the House budget committee.
Middle class household would see a relatively paltry increase of $500 to $1,000 a year, or about 1%, the CBO said. The loss of resources to the lowest earners amounts to 4% of total income for those households, while the increase for the highest earners works out to about a 2% average hike.
The bill would also add an estimated 4 trillion to the budget deficit, potentially setting the stage for more cuts in future years that could worsen the picture for poor and middle-income people.
The estimate was issued as the Republican-led House was poised to vote to enshrine in law about $9 billion in cuts imposed by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
The bill, called a rescission package, approves the cuts DOGE made that virtually dismantled the USAID agency responsible for life-saving foreign aid including the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, a program that has been extremely successful in combating AIDS overseas.
It would also rubber stamp moves to slash assistance to Public Broadcasting Service and National Public Radio stations, which conservatives accuse of liberal bias.
House Speaker Mike Johnson said he is confident he can wrangle the needed near unanimous support of Republican lawmakers to pass the bill through the chamber where the GOP holds a seven-vote edge. If it passes it goes on to the Senate, where it could be approved by a simple majority vote of the body, which Republicans control by a 53-47 margin.
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