On tax policy, former President Donald J. Trump has in recent weeks appeared to emulate Oprah Winfrey, the television legend whose ratings giveaways have become a cultural sensation.
But instead of free cars, Mr. Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, is offering his audience tailored tax cuts. For restaurant and hotel workers in Nevada, a key swing state, Mr. Trump has proposed “no tip tax.” For retired Americans who are voting in large numbers, he has said he would eliminate taxes on Social Security benefits. For business leaders at the Economic Club of New York, Mr. Trump has proposed cutting the corporate tax rate from 21 percent to 15 percent for American manufacturers.
And for his fellow New Yorkers, whom Mr. Trump addressed at a rally Wednesday night, he said he would restore a popular deduction for state and local taxes, known as SALT, a tax break he once limited.
“We will restore SALT,” he said at his rally, adding that the move “would save thousands of dollars for residents of New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.”
Earlier in the evening, he had promised that “if you vote for me, I will reduce your taxes.”
The plans, so far presented in succinct formulas and without detailed explanations, have proven politically popular, drawing crowds at his rallies and even prompting his Democratic rival to adopt a version of his idea. They have also outraged tax and budget experts in Washington, who are up in arms about the rising cost of Mr. Trump’s anti-tax crusade.
“The pattern is this: You show up somewhere, you think about what this person wants, and you give them what they want without worrying about the cost,” said Marc Goldwein, senior policy director for the Responsible Federal Budget Committee, which advocates deficit reduction. “I think that’s really worrisome.”
Mr. Trump has made no secret of the political goals of his tax-cut proposals, telling attendees at a rally in Tucson, Ariz., last week that not taxing Social Security benefits would be a “big deal.” He added: “You seniors will remember that when you go to vote.”
Republicans are trying to hold on to several seats in the Long Island House of Representatives, where Mr. Trump will speak Wednesday and where removing the $10,000 cap on state and local tax deductions is popular. More broadly, Mr. Trump is trying to rebrand his tax plan, long criticized by Democrats as a giveaway to big business and the wealthy, as a handout for the working class.
“It’s time for working men and women to finally get a break,” Trump said of his idea of not taxing overtime.
Mr. Trump brushed aside concerns about the cost of his tax cut proposals by pointing to his plan to raise tariffs, saying the United States would have “no deficit in a relatively short period of time.” The Tax Policy Center, a think tank, has estimated that a 10% tax on all imports, plus higher tariffs on Chinese goods, could raise $2.8 trillion in revenue over 10 years.
But that wouldn’t be enough to cover the cost of all the tax cuts Mr. Trump proposed during the presidential campaign. His most expensive proposal would simply extend the tax cuts he signed in 2017, many of which expire after next year. Including higher debt-servicing costs, continuing those tax cuts would cost about $4.6 trillion over a decade, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
He wants to add even more tax cuts to that, while his running mate, JD Vance, has proposed a dramatic expansion of the child tax credit.
In total, the cost of Mr. Trump’s tax cuts could approach $10 trillion over a decade, according to Andrew Lautz, an analyst at the Bipartisan Policy Center. “The numbers are staggering,” he said.
The budget deficit has been growing steadily in recent years, even as the economy has remained strong, worrying some economists. That’s because governments are typically expected to run smaller budget deficits during periods of strong growth than during economic downturns, when the economy often needs to be boosted. The cost of financing U.S. debt has soared as interest rates remain high, and rating agencies have said they are concerned about the U.S. government’s ability to repay its debts.
That gloomy budget outlook will weigh on lawmakers next year as they decide whether to extend the 2017 tax cuts. They will also have to decide whether to raise the national debt ceiling, which limits the amount of money the United States can borrow.
Republicans have long supported tax cuts, even if they are expected to increase the deficit, in the hope of boosting economic growth. Some of Mr. Trump’s allies see his ideas as a way to encourage work and thus boost the economy. But Erica York, an analyst at the Tax Foundation, which generally favors lower tax rates, said Mr. Trump’s current ideas, which target relatively small groups of Americans, would not generate broad-based economic growth.
“There is no political logic behind this situation, it is political considerations that are taking the wheel,” Ms York said.
Ms. York and other economists generally favor a tax system that doesn’t tax Americans differently depending on where they live, how much they earn, or whether they rent or own a home. In that regard, Mr. Trump’s 2017 tax law helped clean up the tax code, reducing deductions for state and local taxes and mortgage interest while dramatically expanding the standard deduction.
Mr. Trump’s series of campaign tax proposals would swing the tax code in the other direction, opening up new exceptions for workers based on their tips or overtime pay — and for Americans who live in high-tax states like New York and New Jersey.
“This is opening new holes in the tax code, particularly in blue states that don’t vote for us,” said Casey Mulligan, an economist who worked in the White House during the Trump administration. “I don’t really see the economic or political value of this.”
Of course, Mr. Trump’s tax proposals will need to be approved by Congress to become law. And even if Republicans end up controlling the House and Senate next year, Mr. Trump may not find them willing to accept all of his ideas. Senator Michael D. Crapo, Republican of Idaho, would become chairman of the Senate Finance Committee if Republicans win the chamber in November. When asked whether he was concerned about the cost of Mr. Trump’s ideas, he demurred.
“I get asked that question a lot with every proposal he mentions, and the answer is we’re going to have a multi-billion dollar tax code problem next year, and every provision of it raises that question,” he said. “I’ll decide where I stand on that when we know the full picture next year.”
