The Cooperative Society Newsletter
April 2025, Issue 52
By E.G. Nadeau, Ph.D.
Trump has begun his second term as President with a flurry of executive orders downsizing the federal government, reducing assistance to developing countries, and, in early April, doubling down on and then “PAUSE”ing a bewildering array of tariffs around the world: on traditional friends, trade rivals, small developing countries, and even a few uninhabited islands.
His America First Trade Policy, that’s essentially based on bullying the rest of the world, is likely to have serious negative consequences across the globe, including in the United States. I thought about cataloguing the international impacts of his quixotic words and deeds in this article, but decided that such an approach would be too overwhelming for me to write and for you to read.
Instead, the focus of this article is on a brief damage assessment of his administration’s actions at home – on the pocketbooks, health, and other quality of life issues in the United States. There is a caveat to this analysis. Trump changes course a lot. His tariffs and other actions should be viewed as “bargaining chips.” In the 1987 book, The Art of the Deal, which a ghost writer wrote for him, Trump gives his take on how he “masterfully” negotiates deals that are to his advantage. Too many people have the mistaken impression that Trump is a successful businessman and economic genius. Many well-researched analyses, however, have concluded that he is neither of the above. For example, see here and here. So, with his incompetence and self-serving unpredictability in mind, following is a summary of the downward economic spiral in which he is leading the country and its inhabitants.
Let’s start with his campaign promises. The American Federation of Teachers recently noted that during his campaign, Trump “vowed to make housing more affordable, lower grocery prices, . . . and reduce the overall cost of living. But since taking office, [he] has failed to deliver on these promises.”
Based on the analyses of numerous economists, quite the opposite of increasing American prosperity is already well underway. Both the cost of living and the unemployment rate are likely to go up rather than down during Trump’s administration. This phenomenon is commonly referred to as “stagflation,” and is measured by the “Misery Index” (the sum of the inflation rate and the unemployment rate).
For example, the well-respected Budget Lab at Yale University recently published a report that projected the economic impact on American households of Trump’s tariff bombardment and retaliations to it by other countries as calculated on April 15: “The price level from all 2025 tariffs rises by 3% in the short-run, the equivalent of an average per household consumer loss of $4,900 [in 2025] . . . .” As noted above, these estimated numbers will change during the year as the global tariff war transpires.
And that’s just the potential impact of tariffs on US consumers.
When economists analyze the combined hot mess that will result if his economic goals related to tariffs, cutbacks in the federal budget (which appear to be particularly targeting Medicaid’s 70-some million recipients), tax reductions (you guessed it – primarily for large corporations and the wealthy), and an increase in the national debt, they reveal the makings of an historic economic disaster for the United States, and less so, for the rest of the world, over the next couple of years.
And that’s just the fallout from his “economic agenda.”
Then there are the other major domestic disruptions that Trump is setting in motion. To name a couple near the top of the list: the deportation of about 1 million immigrants in 2025 and the slashing of federal health, education, social, and other services.
Again, as many economists are pointing out, the above actions are likely to worsen the quality of life in the United States rather than improve it.
One of the most egregious examples of Trump’s cabinet appointments is Robert Kennedy, Jr. as Secretary of Health and Social Services. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, recently called for him to resign, citing “complete disregard for science.”
On top of all of the above, Americans are beginning to be viewed as pariahs in many other countries. We get booed at hockey games between Canadian and American teams. Tourism in the US by residents of other countries is already starting to suffer, creating a downturn in the US hospitality industry.
Those manufacturing jobs that Trump is promising? Forget about it. With a few exceptions, foreign corporations can’t just pick up and relocate their production facilities to the US overnight. Plus, there’s a good reason why many of those jobs have been outsourced in the first place. They don’t pay much. And without clarity on what Trump will decide to play with in his sandbox from day to day, companies can’t make informed decisions anyway.
Conclusion
In a recent Fox News interview, Trump asserted that “We’re bringing wealth back to America. That’s a big thing. … It takes a little time, but I think it should be great for us.” As this article illustrates, we aren’t heading toward greatness with the bizarre, cobbled-together actions begun during his first three months in office.
Terms likes stagflation and the Misery Index have already come back into our vocabulary in 2025. It will take several years and a dramatic shift in leadership before we have a healthy domestic economy again.