Project 2025 on the Economy: Higher Costs for Average Americans

Project 2025 puts the Republican dream of shifting the burden of funding policies and priorities to the middle and working class on steroids. Its policies would undoubtedly make things more expensive for most Americans and drive an even bigger hole in the federal deficit, crippling its ability to maintain infrastructure, handle crises and fund Americans’ priorities.

The plan accomplishes these wildly unpopular objectives by overhauling income taxes, eliminating deductions, eliminating many aspects of the social safety net, cutting funding for schools and restricting union rights. Here are the highlights:

Union Busting

Big corporations like to secretly hire union-busting consultants to keep unions at bay. Project 2025 proposes to disallow transparency in organizing by forbidding the government from forcing corporations to disclose whether they have hired consultants to prevent unionization. It also considers banning public sector unions.

Project 2025 would make it easier for union-busting corporations to eliminate a union even if workers are in the middle of a signed contract by eliminating the “contract bar rule.” It would also make it easier for companies to discipline or fire workers who attempt to organize.

The Trump Project 2025 agenda states that workers whose jobs are shipped overseas should get “no special treatment.”

Lower Wages

Project 2025 would make it easier for big corporations to pay even lower wages. One way it would do this is to allow states and local governments to ask for waivers from federal laws like the Fair Labor Standards Act, which is the law that sets minimum wage and overtime rates and the National Labor Relations Act, which protects unions.

The plan also makes it easier for companies not to pay overtime by reducing eligibility and allowing companies to “combine” work weeks to avoid paying overtime. It would also allow the substitution of paid time off for overtime pay.

Reduced Education Funding

Project 2025 would dismantle the Department of Education and eliminate Head Start and Title I funding. It would also severely limit access to student lunch programs and programs for students with disabilities.

Title I funding provides critical resources for poor and underserved students. However, it plays a role in all states’ education funding. On average, about 10 percent of state funds for education come from Title I resources. Some states might be able to fill the gaps, but others will not. This will affect poorer states and rural areas most harshly as public schools are often the only option for students in these areas.

The NEA estimates this would cost approximately 180,300 teaching jobs and force over 800,000 students out of early learning services, neither of which would be a boost to the economy.

More Expensive Student Loans

Project 2025 proposes making student loan payback more expensive by eliminating income-based payments and all student loan forgiveness programs and giving all student loans over to private banks.

Independent analysis has shown these changes could cost the average borrower $2,700 to $4,000 more annually.

Shifting the Federal Tax Burden to the Middle Class

Project 2025 would eliminate our progressive tax bracket system, under which the rich pay a greater share of their incomes than poor or middle-class families, and replace it with a two-bracket system that dramatically shifts the share of income taxes paid to middle-class families. This would raise taxes by about $3000 for a family of four making around the median household income.

In contrast, it would “provide an average $1.5–2.4 million tax cut for the 45,000 U.S. households making more than $10 million annually.” (CAP)

Like Donald Trump’s proposals, Project 2025 would also reduce taxes on the largest corporations, putting their tax rate at less than half of what it was under Obama and previous administrations.

Project 2025 also calls for implementing a national sales tax and eliminating all deductions, although without specifics. Popular middle-class deductions include the child tax credit, which Harris would increase, the mortgage deduction and the marriage deduction.

Cutting Safety Nets

Project 2025 would abolish the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and eliminate or reduce the Federal Reserve’s powers, which include the backing of consumer deposits.

It would also greatly reduce access to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, or food stamps) and cap individual Medicaid benefits.

The entire plan reeks of creating a caste system in which those who are already wealthy stay wealthy, and no one else is given the opportunity to get ahead.