Former President Trump promised to end the “inflation nightmare” and bring down prices “very quickly.” His plan has two goals: increasing tariffs on foreign producers and replacing the performance-based federal income tax with a uniform consumption tax on goods and services.

The same plan was a central part of his economic policy during his tenure in the White House. In 2018, tariffs were imposed on steel, aluminum, washing machines, solar panels and a variety of Chinese goods; the overall trade deficit grew by $68.8 billion, or 12.5 percent.

Trump plans to keep raising tariffs because he believes it will create good-paying manufacturing jobs. But this bill is fundamentally wrong and comparable to the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930, which raised tariffs across the board. It was intended to protect domestic manufacturing and farmers while limiting job losses, but had the opposite effect. The tariff increases ultimately strangled global trade and are now widely blamed for worsening the Great Depression. If Trump wins in November, a much more aggressive approach to tariffs is expected, including a flat 10% on nearly all imports and 60% on Chinese goods. The Chinese tariffs alone could add $1,950 to the annual cost of American households.

The idea of ​​replacing the federal income tax with a flat tax is not new. The Republican Fair Tax Act, first introduced in 1999, is supposedly designed to “get rid of the IRS,” appealing to those Americans who hate the tax agency. It is believed that a flat tax of about 30% on everything we buy (food, cars, homes, services) would be needed to raise the same amount of tax revenue. One analysis found that most Americans will pay more in taxes, except for the top 5% of earners. Worse, the flat tax significantly disadvantages low- and middle-income people because it places a higher burden on them; each dollar they pay represents a much larger share of their total income.

And a flat tax won’t eliminate the IRS, but it could increase the government’s tax filing and tax collection costs. Tax revenue, tax compliance, and taxpayer representation must still exist on inheritance, gift, and excise taxes. It’s time we looked at what Trump’s tariff and tax plan really means: Only the rich benefit.

Catherine Voutaz was born and raised in Bountiful. She has over 25 years of experience in auditing, accounting, compliance, risk assessment and data analytics and is currently running for Utah State Auditor. She worked for over 10 years with the IRS, graduated from Weber State University and continued her graduate education in the Master of Accountancy program with a concentration in taxation at UNR. Catherine is the current president of the Women’s Democratic Club of Utah and lives in Herriman with her husband.

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