Then and Now...
A year ago, July 06 2026, I wrote
Hey, so, your members of congress knew this ... or should have known it ... or certainty could have known it before they voted on the big fugly budget bill last week.
It hurts Americans in the 40 million households who can least afford to be hurt.It doesn't help that much in the 79 million households it helps.
But it sure is expensive, so....
Since *you* know *they* know, maybe send an email or letter (I hear congressional staff really like letters) so *they* know *you* know, too...
... and that you won't forget what the 51 in the Senate and the 218 in the House did — and what they failed to do...
... and who is paying the price for that...
... and who is benefiting from it...
... and whether or not you think their vote was a worthwhile expression of your American values.
Lately, it seems necessary to state the obvious:
- Losing $1,600 means a whole more to a household making $0 - $39k a year than gaining $12,000 means to a household with income of $217k - $517k.
- Facing the loss of $133 a month, a low income family of four may have to choose between nutrition, prescription drugs, a trip to the dentist, and keeping the lights on.
- With an extra $1000 a month, a high income family of four could lease a Tesla, or pop for a week at the White Lotus.
Now, one year later, to our shame, it's all playing out as predicted.
Americans living at the bottom of the income distribution will end the year down about $1600 .— losing about 130 bucks a month that *was* going to housing, food, medical care, and job expenses before the Republican Congress and President made it disappear into the pockets of Americans at the top of the distribution — who will end up with about a grand a month more than they would have taken in without the One Big Ugly Bill.
Independent researchers call this “one of the largest transfers of wealth from working families to the ultra-rich in American history.”
For your/our/my neighbors at the bottom of the economy, losing $130 a month is a much bigger deal than gaining $1,000 a month is for our neighbors at the top. Congress and this Administration are using public policy to deepen hardship for our most vulnerable households — and they knew that when they passed the bill a year ago this week.
Oh ... and it also adds between $3 and $4 trillion to the national deficit over the next decade.
What do you call it when someone chooses something they know is making the poor materially poorer to make the rich insignificantly richer, while adding consequentially to the deficit?
I call it foolishness ... I call it oppression ... I call it calculated evil.
The clearest path forward is sending members of the current majority in the Senate and House of Representatives back to the private sector to learn whatever they may from those who sent them to Washington to do the people's work.
In those seats, let us put people for whom *to know better is to do better* for the good of the nation and the world.
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