Here’s a letter to a new correspondent:
Mr. C__:
Thanks for your e-mail.
You ask why I “focus on tariffs without praising President Trump for the DOGE budget savings.”
Two reasons: First, while I applaud efforts to cut the U.S. government down to size, I worry that Trump’s attempt to do so through unilateral executive action will be easily reversed when the likes of Pres. Whitmer is sworn into office on January 20th, 2029. Although Trump didn’t start the Imperial Presidency, his Jacobin-style of ruling is pushing that malignant manner of governing to unprecedented extremes. As a result, Pres. Whitmer (or Newsom, or Shapiro) will rule even more imperially and destructively than otherwise when the Democrats retake the White House.
Second, Elon Musk now says that DOGE will save American taxpayers $160 billion, or about $1,210 per household. That’s nice. But the Yale Budget Lab estimates that the per-household costs of all the Trump tariffs announced through “Liberation Day” will be $3,789 – or more than triple what DOGE will save each household.
Given the great costs of these tariffs, and the unfathomable economic ignorance that fuels them, my time is best spent focused on Trump’s calamitous protectionism.
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Professor of Economics
and
Martha and Nelson Getchell Chair for the Study of Free Market Capitalism at the Mercatus Center
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA 22030
