#economics + #politics

The U.S. Dollar Index, which measures the greenback against other major currencies, logged its steepest six-month drop in more than 50 years in the first half of 2025. Though the decline hasn’t deepened, the dollar index is still about 10% lower than the start of Trump’s term.

A strong dollar makes imports cheaper and can help keep inflation in check. A weak one can increase prices on foreign goods but boost American exports.

Trump has suggested a strong dollar puts the U.S. at a disadvantage and that a weak dollar helps American industry. And as with most things with Trump, he’s been blunter in his messaging.

“You make a hell of a lot more money with a weaker dollar,” he said last year, one of a number of public statements showing his preference for seeing the dollar decline.

Trump isn’t alone in seeing benefits of a weaker buck.

In recent months, corporate earnings calls have been peppered with talk of how a weaker dollar has helped companies from Philip Morris to Coca-Cola, with executives pulling out C-suite phrases like “favorable currency impact” to note how the dip brought tailwinds outside the U.S. that added to bottom lines.

Currency values are constantly moving and, while the dollar’s recent fall is notable, it has reached lower levels at points in the presidencies of each of Trump’s predecessors, back through the creation of the Dollar Index in 1973, when Richard Nixon was at the helm.

Kenneth Rogoff, a Harvard University economist and former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, says while “a lot of policies that Trump is doing are something of a cancer for the dollar,” he believes that it was destined to fall no matter who was in charge.

“The dollar had been on a 15-year bull run,” he said. “I would argue the dollar is still wildly overvalued, and over the next maybe five or six years, it might fall 15%.”

What does that mean for American consumers? Rogoff says commodity prices are likely to rise, particularly with the impact of the Iran war on fuel prices.

“They’re just going to go up,” he says, “no matter what the dollar’s at.”

Total effective tax rates (includes all taxes: federal+state income tax, sales tax, property tax, etc) for the richest Americans declined by 2018 to a level beneath that of the bottom 50% of earners,[18] contributing to wealth inequality. Analysis by economists Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman.

The Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA /ˈfaɪkə/) is a United States federal payroll (or employment) tax payable by both employees and employers to fund Social Security and Medicare[1]—federal programs that provide benefits for retirees, people with disabilities, and children of deceased workers.

Since 1990, the employee's share of the Social Security portion of the FICA tax has been 6.2% of gross compensation up to a limit that adjusts with inflation.[a][9] The taxation limit in 2020 was $137,700 of gross compensation, resulting in a maximum Social Security tax for 2020 of $8,537.40.[7] This limit, known as the Social Security Wage Base, goes up each year based on average national wages and, in general, at a faster rate than the Consumer Price Index (CPI-U). The employee's share of the Medicare portion of the tax is 1.45% of wages, with no limit on the amount of wages subject to the Medicare portion of the tax.

So personal income tax in the US is ~30% for most of us (ranging from ~10%-37%), compared to Social Security's ~6.2% Medicare is 1.45% (or 12.4% + 2.9% if you count the employer portion). AND only the first ~$137K is taxable so our maximum tax amount to Social Security and Medicare is capped, while normal income tax that politicians can direct to anything from foreign wars to immigration enforcement to redistribution to different states or interest on debt driven by tax breaks to the rich that caused deficits.

An average of 9,000 refugees were admitted monthly between January 2024 to January 2025. From February to December 2025, there were 1,226 total admissions, 1,059 of whom were from South Africa.

It's quite disappointing that these policies - especially the H1B tax, which brings the best and brightest in the world to the US - all target legal immigrants.

I love this report!

This data-driven, impartial report contains historic metrics — how you use them to advocate for the changes you want to see in the country is up to you.

Most spending was on Social Security, national defense, grants to state and local governments, Medicare, and interest on the debt. Spending and revenue were both higher than their pre-pandemic levels, and the federal government ran another deficit as spending outpaced revenue.

Why do we always lump Social Security in with other national spending? Social Security is collected separately from all other tax revenue and goes directly to the Social Security trust fund. That money cannot be put anywhere else. Politicians can't direct Social Security goes into a trust fund and politicians can't change how it's spent, unlike defense spending and other spending. In my view, Social Security should be separate. It's not the government's money to spend, it's money that is given back to the people directly. So comparing national defense, which the government can choose to change the spending levels, reallocate it to other spending priorities, Social Security cannot be because it's a trust fund.

Public schools took in and spent more funds than ever before. It also had mixed impacts on teachers and students. The number of public-school teachers has increased each year since 2020 while the number of students has decreased or stayed the same. Meanwhile, test scores have fallen.

Well we have to do something about that and be drastic about it. However, I don't see how cutting funding alone - the current Republican priority - will help.

Even without adding in Trump’s own $5.5 billion net worth, Forbes estimates that his top advisors are worth $7.5 billion, more than doubling the $3.2 billion combined worth of Trump’s 2019 Cabinet. (By contrast, Biden’s Cabinet of regular Joes was barely worth $110 million combined in 2021.)

Nearly 400 millionaires and billionaires from 24 countries are calling on global leaders to increase taxes on the super-rich, amid growing concern that the wealthiest in society are buying political influence.

“A handful of global oligarchs with extreme wealth have bought up our democracies; taken over our governments; gagged the freedom of our media; placed a stranglehold on technology and innovation; deepened poverty and social exclusion; and accelerated the breakdown of our planet,” it reads. “What we treasure, rich and poor alike, is being eaten away by those intent on growing the gulf between their vast power and everyone else.

“The super-rich are being given complete free rein. It is beyond comprehension that the richest 1% now own three times more than the world’s total public wealth combined.

In just the past week, President Donald Trump has ordered defense companies to halt dividends and stock buybacks, and limited executive compensation to $5 million a year; ordered Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to buy $200 billion of mortgage-backed securities; ordered an array of energy firms to invest in Venezuelan oil infrastructure, called for a 10 percent cap on credit card interest rates; announced steps to ban institutional purchases of single-family homes; and opened a criminal investigation into Jerome Powell's handling of Federal Reserve building renovations in an attempt to influence monetary policy.

The SNAP shutdown halts roughly $8 billion a month in federal food assistance — money that usually flows straight into grocery stores and helps feed 42 million Americans. Without it, both low-income households and major retailers like Walmart, Aldi and Kroger feel the pinch. Driving the news: Companies and nonprofits are rolling out new programs to keep food flowing — from free grocery credits to multimillion-dollar donations.