--- description: "This bill will result in easily the largest one-time upward redistribution of income in U.S. history," writes economist Josh Bivens. title: The GOP Budget Takes From the Poor and Gives to the Rich image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt165f670eec6ae934/6998c7fad32e93fde4cd724b/Mike-Johnson-Budget.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Ideas](/section/ideas/) ## Ideas Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [politics](/tag/politics/) ## politics Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # I’m an Economist. The GOP Budget Undeniably Takes From the Working Class and Gives to the Rich by [Josh Bivens](/author/josh-bivens/) ## Josh Bivens Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Contributor Jul 3, 2025 1:48 PM CUT  U.S. Speaker of the House Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) speaks to reporters outside his office at the U.S. Capitol on July 3, 2025 in Washington, DC. The House has approved the rule for the Senate-passed of President Donald Trump’s “One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act” overnight. U.S. Speaker of the House Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) speaks to reporters outside his office at the U.S. Capitol on July 3, 2025 in Washington, DC. The House has approved the rule for the Senate-passed of President Donald Trump’s “One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act” overnight.Alex Wong—Getty Images by [Josh Bivens](/author/josh-bivens/) ## Josh Bivens Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Contributor Jul 3, 2025 1:48 PM CUT The GOP claims to be the party of the working class. Their budget, which House Republicans are [rushing](https://time.com/7299765/big-beautiful-bill-house-republicans-trump/ "undefined") to vote on, says the opposite. There has been a lot of discussion recently about what _New York Times_ writer David Leonhardt has [called](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/13/briefing/democrats-elections-poll.html "undefined") the “class inversion of American politics—with most professionals supporting Democrats and more working-class people backing Republicans.” If this political “class inversion” is real, it seems awfully hard to square with the signature policy of the second Trump Administration: the so-called “One Big, Beautiful Bill” (OBBB). This bill will result in easily the largest [one-time upward redistribution of income ](https://budgetlab.yale.edu/research/distributional-effects-selected-provisions-house-and-senate-reconciliation-bills "undefined")in U.S. history. Take one jarring symmetry: the spending cuts to health care and food assistance programs in the bill will average about [$120 billion](https://www.cbo.gov/publication/61533 "undefined") each year over the next decade while the new tax cuts for households already making over $500,000 each year will average just over [$120 billion per year](https://www.jct.gov/getattachment/1332c86f-04b9-4b89-a418-1df4804e7427/x-33-25.pdf "undefined"). The OBBB combines staggeringly large benefits to the richest households in the country with [outright cuts to incomes of the bottom 40%](https://www.cbo.gov/publication/61387 "undefined"). This combination of spending cuts for the vulnerable and tax cuts for the rich leads to the stunning result summarized in a recent report by the Congressional Budget Office: the poorest 20% of U.S. households will see income losses of almost 4% under this bill while the richest 10% will see gains of over 2%. In dollar terms, the tax provisions of the OBBB are equivalent to writing annual checks of $296,000 to every single taxpayer with an annual income over $5 million, and checks of $55,300 to all taxpayers with annual incomes between $1 million and $5 million. **_Read more:_** [**_The ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ Would Pour Billions Into ICE’s Budget_**](https://time.com/7299360/big-beautiful-bill-trump-ice-immigration/ "undefined") The steep [cuts to Medicaid](https://time.com/7290575/joni-ernst-medicaid-big-beautiful-bill-mike-johnson/ "undefined") and health insurance subsidies in the marketplace exchanges established by the Affordable Care Act (ACA) will lead to [17 million](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/07/01/least-17-million-americans-would-lose-insurance-under-trump-plan/ "undefined") people losing health insurance coverage. These coverage losses won’t just cause suffering for those newly uninsured now unable to access needed health care without financial catastrophe, they will [ripple](https://time.com/7278035/the-dangers-of-slashing-medicaid/ "undefined") through the health system and the larger economy, causing damage everywhere. For example, rural hospitals have been huge beneficiaries of the ACA’s Medicaid expansion. The rate of rural hospital closure in expansion states (that is, states that accepted the ACA money to expand Medicaid for their residents) is [62% lower](https://www.chartis.com/sites/default/files/documents/Rural%20Hospital%20Vulnerability-The%20Chartis%20Group.pdf "undefined") than in states that refused the ACA expansions. Hospitals generally rely on Medicaid for 20% of their total revenue, and rural hospitals have razor-thin operating margins. The OBBB cuts to Medicaid are guaranteed to cause [rural hospital closures](https://time.com/7298891/rural-hospitals-closing-explained-health-care/ "undefined"). These closures will leave rural residents with fewer places to receive needed care and will starve weak rural economies of needed jobs. Counties that currently rely heavily on Medicaid to cover their potential workers (those between the ages of 19 and 64) also have [higher-than-average ](https://www.epi.org/blog/house-budget-bill-would-kick-15-million-people-off-health-insurance-and-damage-local-economies/ "undefined")unemployment rates. This means that the Medicaid cuts called for in the OBBB will especially impact counties that are already struggling economically. If we just look at the Medicaid cuts likely to fall on counties with an unemployment rate that is 0.5% above the national average (a decent marker for a fragile local economy), this would imply roughly 850,000 jobs (only about a quarter of them directly in health care) could be destroyed by the Medicaid cuts in those counties. **_Read more:_** [**_The ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ Is Massively Unpopular and Democrats Plan to Keep It That Way_**](https://dash.parsely.com/time.com/posts/Yb1L7rhqkLe-the-big-beautiful-bill-is-massively-unpopular-and-democrats-plan-to-keep-it-that-way/?minutes=10 "undefined") Finally, it’s worth noting that even with these highly destructive cuts, the Senate version adds nearly [$4 trillion](https://www.npr.org/2025/07/02/nx-s1-5454598/the-gops-massive-bill-would-add-trillions-of-dollars-to-the-countrys-debt "undefined") to the national debt over the next 10 years. This demonstrates again how staggeringly tilted to the top its tax cuts are. Take one example: if we took on $4 trillion in new debt and just distributed it on a lump-sum basis across the entire country, we could give $12,000 to every adult and child in the U.S. Instead, because the OBBB gives the very rich much more than this (more than 100 times more, in fact), other families (mostly poor) are forced to accept outright cuts to their incomes. The OBBB is stunning only in how brazenly it takes from the bottom to give to the top. It should be embarrassing for any party to champion such a reverse-Robin Hood bill. It should be really embarrassing for a party hoping to convince people that it has changed its spots and is now really a champion for the working class. Given that it has been rammed through on a party-line vote with near-unanimous support from the GOP, we all know the truth. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/7299897/gop-budget-gives-to-the-rich/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/7299897/gop-budget-gives-to-the-rich/"},"headline":"I’m an Economist. 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