While the Democratic Party is messaging off of an "Affordability Crisis" largely caused by Bidenomics, the Trump economy is producing major gains for the middle class.
While the legacy media have turned a blind eye to these economic wins, Americans are getting help in a few major ways: taxes, drug prices, and inflation.
The headliner here? Tax refunds are going up. That means more Americans are keeping more of their hard-earned money.
The main tax reductions under Trump’s plan come from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which includes the Working Families Tax Cuts. The bill extends and makes permanent key provisions of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, while adding new targeted deductions aimed at certain workers and seniors.
As Just the News reported, this has led to a boon in tax refunds.
The Internal Revenue Service issued $296 billion in refunds during the 2026 filing season, a 17% increase from the previous year, as millions of Americans benefited from President Donald Trump's signature tax law, according to a new Government Accountability Office report.
The increase represented $43 billion more in refunds than the IRS had issued during the 2025 filing season for tax year 2024. The average refund also increased by $333, or 11%, compared with the previous year, according to the full report.
The GAO attributed the larger refunds, in part, to millions of taxpayers claiming new deductions created by recent tax law changes in Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBB), including provisions allowing deductions for qualified tips and overtime.
The IRS also issued more refunds overall, sending out more than 8 million additional refunds compared with 2025.
Here are a few ways the One Big Beautiful Bill helps the middle class, specifically, and isn't a "tax benefit for the rich":
- No Taxes on Tips: Eligible workers in traditionally tipped jobs can deduct up to $25,000 in qualified tips. The deduction phases out for single filers with MAGI over $150,000 ($300,000 for joint filers).
- No Taxes on Overtime: Workers can deduct the premium portion of qualified overtime pay up to $12,500 for single filers or $25,000 for joint filers. It phases out at higher incomes.
- Seniors Deduction: Individuals aged 65 and older receive an additional $6,000 deduction. It phases out at roughly $75,000 MAGI for singles ($150,000 joint) and helps more seniors offset taxable Social Security, though it does not fully eliminate taxes on those benefits.
In addition, the child tax credit maximum was raised to $2,200, along with a temporary boost to the standard deduction, and a substantially higher SALT deduction cap (around $40,000, subject to income limits).
While the benefits to the middle class are palpable, the Tax Foundation's top-line analysis shows minimal impact to the federal budget, but a modest boost to GDP growth.
This brings us to inflation. The Trump economy is seeing major gains fighting a scourge that has hammered the economy in recent years. No small feat.
The stabilization of the inflation rate can be seen in this chart below.
— Kyle Becker (@kylenabecker) August 16, 2026
The inflation rate is down again in July, coming off of a June decline of 0.4 percent. This was the largest decline since April 2020 — and below many forecasts. Core inflation fell to 2.6 percent year-over-year, better than expected.
If you are looking for a reason why inflation is stabilizing, look no further than the M2 money supply. While it continues to increase, it is tracking closer to GDP, nearing pre-pandemic levels.
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America is still trying to dig itself out of the disastrous COVID pandemic response, and the hundreds of billions of dollars in ensuing fraud.
There is another interesting nugget in all of this, if you drill down on the inflation numbers. Blue cities are much worse at managing the Affordability Crisis than Red Cities.
Here's the data on the fall in prescription drug prices. A seven-month decline for the 1st time on record. That's a massive achievement by Trump and you haven't heard about it, while Bernie Sanders and El-Sayed promise to raise taxes to do something that Trump already did. (3/3) pic.twitter.com/t6DzDSArz8
— Joel Pollak (@joelpollak) August 13, 2026
Joel Pollak pointed out the disparity online, as well as noting another win for the Trump economy: Drug prices are plummeting.
Scott Jennings recently hailed the news while on CNN.
.@ScottJenningsKY: “We learned for the first time in 60 years, prescription drug prices are falling. Every single politician, everybody here who’s ever worked for 'em said they were gonna do it. Trump and the Republicans finally did it. There is a story to tell.” pic.twitter.com/IAHu64tITa
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) August 16, 2026
“We learned for the first time in 60 years, prescription drug prices are falling," he said. "Every single politician, everybody here who’s ever worked for 'em said they were gonna do it. Trump and the Republicans finally did it. There is a story to tell.”
As of the latest data, prescription drug prices fell 3.1 percent year-over-year — the steepest annual decline since March 1963. On top of that, prescription and over-the-counter drugs fell 2.7 percent over the same period, which is being reported as the largest drop on record.
Before one considers voting for Democratic Socialists promising to "fix" the Affordability Crisis, know that they are not offering a solution; they are offering a trap.
When the U.S. government spends far more than it takes in, and gives money away to the Democrat Party's clientele for the sole purpose of building power, it is creating an Unaffordability Crisis.
It's time that we get an "adult in the room" to tell the government to simply stop spending. Much like handing a teenager a credit card and then later scolding him about his unsustainable lifestyle, the solution is to stop enabling the reckless behavior.
We are living with the negative consequences of the government's spending spree, and if the Trump administration is going to cash in on its gains, it is going to have to do much more to rein in out-of-control spending.
Thus, while these economic wins are positive, it is merely buying us time to do the right thing.
We need to repair our broken institutions — America cannot survive the fatal combination of open borders, a huge welfare state, and fiat currency.
