The last year of Trump's first term was an economic disaster.
This time around, Trump isn't trying to redeem himself. He's picking up right where he left off.
Less than six months into Trump 2.0, the job market is collapsing, prices are rising—and Trump's "concepts of a plan" for healthcare have been revealed: In order to fund more fascism and more tax breaks for the rich, Trump and the GOP plan to rip healthcare away from 17 million Americans.
Trump's "One Big Beautiful Bill" is such a Big Ugly Betrayal to so many Americans that it's opposed by everyone from Elon Musk to AOC, Rand Paul to Bernie Sanders.
Currently on track to pass the House, the bill is even a betrayal to Trump himself.
Billionaires Trump Hillbillies
Writing for The F*cking News, Jonathan Larsen details all the devastation JD Vance just voted to inflict on all the "impoverished or semi-poverished people he grew up with," in a Senate bill that will, among other things:
- Cut Medicaid by about $800 billion
- Strip health insurance from 17 million people
- Cut food assistance to poor families by $285 billion
- Close 27% of nursing homes
- Kill more than 800,000 jobs
- Raise electric bills by 10%
- Cut corporate taxes permanently and overtime/tip taxes temporarily
- Knock $95 billion off the gross domestic product of individual states starting next year
- Increase the national debt by $3.3 trillion over ten years
In addition to fewer jobs, less healthcare, higher prices, and more hunger, the bill will also mean less clean energy and more pollution for the kinds of voters JD Vance grew up with.
To give him credit, Elon Musk did promise MAGA voters more hardship. Apparently, it's what they wanted. As Larsen notes: "In the 200 U.S. counties most reliant on Medicare and Medicaid, 84% of people voted for Trump."
Tariff Taxation Brings Rapid Inflation
Trump came into office promising to reduce the price of "groceries." Just a few months later, he'd prefer to bomb Iran than talk about the cost of eggs, coffee, or beef.
And if prices weren't high enough already, Food and Wine warns that, due to our heavy reliance on Canada, Mexico, and China for fresh produce and canned goods, consumers could see prices increase "especially sharply at the register this summer."
Not surprisingly, consumer confidence numbers slid again in June, with confidence in the US economy at its lowest point since May 2020. The Conference Board's "Expectations Index" — where any reading below 80 signals a recession ahead — fell to 69.
This week, CNBC reported on new research showing "steep declines in online shopping activity," with 34% of consumers saying they had delayed purchases due to uncertainty over prices.
Meanwhile, Reuters reported that "US prices for China-made goods on Amazon" are now rising "faster than inflation."
AI Acceleration Speeds Job Evaporation
After 48 consecutive months of job growth under Biden, Trump inherited an economy that was the "envy of the world" and threw it all away as recklessly as he had once tossed Obama's pandemic playbook into the circular file.
Biden had made sure that, amid rapid advances in AI, workers would also get a seat at the table.
Trump trashed Biden's AI plans, too, giving a rogue's gallery of union-busting broligarchs permission to reshape society at hyperspeed.
In 2025, corporations are obediently embracing "Agentic AI" as they wait for the "Gentle Singularity" and a new era of "Radical Abundance."
Q: What does all that mean in practice?
A: The job market is deteriorating fast. If employers are not already firing, they've definitely stopped hiring.
ADP's June 2025 private sector jobs report was expected to show an increase of 100,000 jobs. It actually showed a loss of 33,000. And because May's increase was revised down to just 29,000, the combined number for May and June is already in negative territory.
While mainstream media's initial take on the government's just-released June 2025 jobs report showing 147,000 jobs created is that it was "stronger than expected" (CNN) and shows "healthy hiring" (NYT), the headline number was surprisingly inflated by state and local government hiring. The number of private sector jobs created — expected at 105,000 — was a disappointing 74,000. "Bottom line: It's hard to find a job right now outside of healthcare and education," wrote economist and Washington Post columnist Heather Long on X.
Trump promised us a "New Golden Age." In less that six months, he's created an employment crisis and an inflation crisis. And now his "Big, Beautiful Bill" will deliver another gut punch — taking food and healthcare away from millions of Americans just when they need them most.
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Further reading:
June 2025: The Trump Jobs Crisis
The Trump Jobs Crisis
The broligarchs have been unleashed. AI is coming for your job. And Trump has no plan to protect you.
Richard Hine
April 2025: Paying for Trump's Stupidity
Paying for Trump’s Stupidity
He costs us money. He threatens our future. He makes us all less safe.
Richard Hine
February 2025: The Next Trump Crash:
The Next Trump Crash
Job growth is slowing. Inflation fears are surging. “The Trump bump in consumer confidence is already over,” reports WSJ.
Richard Hine
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