Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
Evaluating Trump’s first ‘Hundred Day’ economic plan
Evaluating Trump’s first ‘Hundred Day’ economic plan
Apr 26, 2025 6:35 PM

In a radio address on July 24, 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt referred to the 100-day session of the 73rd United States Congress between March 9 and June 17, a session thatproduced a record-breaking volume of new laws.

Despite the fact that the 100 days referred to a legislative session and not the beginning of a presidency, the term has e a metric for what a new president can plish and how effective they will be during their term. For this reason, president-elects often lay out a proposal for what they hope to plish during the early days after the Inauguration.

During a speech at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania last October, Donald Trumplaid out his own planfor what he’d do in his first days.

Below is a summary of all the actions related to economics that Trump promised to tackle in his Hundred Days and an evaluation of what he actually plished:

EXECUTIVE ACTIONS

The following are actions Trump said he would take either through the executive orders or through the other powers of his office:

Promise: Issue a requirement that for every new federal regulation, two existing regulations must be eliminated.

Evaluation: Promise kept. Ten days after taking office the president signed an executive order titled, “Reducing Regulation And Controlling Regulatory Costs.”One of the provisions of the order is that whenever an executive department or agency publicly proposes for notice ment or otherwise promulgates a new regulation, it must identify at least two existing regulations to be repealed.

Promise: Announce his intention to renegotiate NAFTA or withdraw from the deal under Article 2205.

Evaluation: Promise deferred. According to Trump, he was all set to announce his intent to renegotiate NAFTA—and then had his mind changed by phone calls with the leaders of Canada and Mexico.

Promise: Announce that the United States will be withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Evaluation: Promise kept. Trump withdrew from the trade agreement three days after taking office.

Promise: Direct his Secretary of the Treasury to label China a currency manipulator.

Evaluation: Promise broken. “They’re not currency manipulators,” Trump told The Wall Street Journal in April.

Promise: Direct his Secretary of Commerce and U.S. Trade Representative to identify all foreign trading abuses that “unfairly impact American workers” and direct them to use “every tool under American and international law to end those abuses immediately.”

Evaluation: Promise kept. In April Trump signed an executive order calling for pletion of a large-scale report to identify “every form of trade abuse and every non-reciprocal practice that now contributes to the U.S. trade deficit.”

Promise: Lift the restrictions on the production of $50 trillion dollars’ worth of job-producing American energy reserves, including shale, oil, natural gas and clean coal.

Evaluation: In process. Trump signed an executive order to that will begin rolling back some of the energy restriction put in place by President Obama.

Promise: Remove any obstacles to “vital energy infrastructure projects” (e.g., the Keystone Pipeline) so that the projects can move forward.

Evaluation: Promise kept. Four days after taking office Trump signed a memo clearing the way for construction on the Keystone XL Pipeline.

Promise: Cancel billions in payments to U.N. climate change programs and use the money to fix America’s water and environmental infrastructure.

Evaluation: Pending. Trump included this in his proposed budget, but it’s unclear whether Congress will cancel the payments.

LEGISLATIVE PROPOSALS

The following are proposals for economic-related legislation that President Trump said he would send to Congress:

Promise: Middle Class Tax Relief And Simplification Act— An economic plan designed to grow the economy 4% per year and create at least 25 million new jobs through massive tax reduction and simplification, bination with trade reform, regulatory relief, and lifting the restrictions on American energy. The largest tax reductions are for the middle class. A middle-class family with 2 children will get a 35% tax cut. The current number of brackets will be reduced from 7 to 3, and tax forms will likewise be greatly simplified. The business rate will be lowered from 35 to 15 percent, and the trillions of dollars of American corporate money overseas can now be brought back at a 10 percent rate.

Evaluation: Partial credit. In an attempt to get something out before the Hundred Day deadline, the Trump administration released a one-page outline on tax reform. No detailed plan yet exists, though, and nothing has been sent to Congress.

Promise: End The Offshoring Act— Establishes tariffs to panies from laying off their workers in order to relocate in other countries and ship their products back to the U.S. tax-free.

Evaluation: Promise broken. No legislation has been proposed by the Trump administration.

Promise: American Energy & Infrastructure Act— Leverages public-private partnerships, and private investments through tax incentives, to spur $1 trillion in infrastructure investment over 10 years. It is revenue neutral.

Evaluation: Promise broken. No legislation has been proposed by the Trump administration.

Promise: School Choice And Education Opportunity Act— Redirects education dollars to give parents the right to send their kid to the public, private, charter, magnet, religious or home school of their choice. mon core, brings education supervision to munities. It expands vocational and technical education, and make 2 and 4-year college more affordable.

Evaluation: Promise broken. No legislation has been proposed by the Trump administration.

Promise: Repeal and Replace Obamacare Act— Fully repeals Obamacare and replaces it with Health Savings Accounts, the ability to purchase health insurance across state lines, and lets states manage Medicaid funds. Reforms will also include cutting the red tape at the FDA: there are over 4,000 drugs awaiting approval, and we especially want to speed the approval of life-saving medications.

Evaluation: Promise deferred. Neither the Trump administration nor Republicans in Congress have a way to fully repeal Obamacare, and the current plan to make changes has been rejected by both Democrats and conservative Republicans.

Promise: Affordable Childcare and Eldercare Act— Allows Americans to deduct childcare and elder care from their taxes, incentivizes employers to provide on-side childcare services, and creates tax-free Dependent Care Savings Accounts for both young and elderly dependents, with matching contributions for e families.

Evaluation: Promise broken. No legislation has been proposed by the Trump administration.

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
Beisner Responds
In the latest Interfaith Stewardship Alliance newsletter, dated Oct. 21, Cal Beisner passes along his response to the letters sent by Bill Moyers’ legal counsel (background on the matter with related links here). Here’s what Beisner says as related through his own counsel: Your letter of October 18, 2006, to Interfaith Stewardship Alliance and your letter of October 19, 2006, to Dr. E. Calvin Beisner have been sent to me by my clients for reply. I have carefully examined the...
Not as Sick as You Think
In a column yesterday, George Will coined a term that deserves widespread use: economic hypochondria. He criticizes the way in which the media—and many of us, even though relatively “healthy,” financially—pounce on every bit of news that might be interpreted as indicating economic hardship. Will’s column has a certain partisan bent to it, but one needn’t be a Republican to see the larger point. As liberal writer Gregg Easterbrook observed in The Progress Paradox, even the poorest Americans enjoy a...
Capitalism and the Common Good: The Ten Pillars of the Moral Economy
Sirico: No moral conflicts with rooting for the Tigers On Friday afternoon, Rev. Robert A. Sirico addressed an audience of Acton Supporters at the Detroit Athletic Club in Detroit, Michigan. His address was titled Capitalism and the Common Good: The Ten Pillars of the Moral Economy, and we are pleased to make it available to you here (10.5 mb mp3 file). I would be remiss if I failed to note that the event took place on the eve of the...
Stossel and Symmetric Information
Jim Aune, blogger-in-chief at The plained yesterday about his health care treatment. He says, “I have been in constant pain for 36 hours. I actually used a cane to go to the office yesterday for some meetings. The problem? I have a trapped nerve in my abdomen from a double hernia repair a year ago. I got shot up with steroids about 3 weeks ago, and that worked for about 5 days, but I still can’t walk without a ripping...
Transforming Lives in Nashville
NASHVILLE – The event was billed as an “appreciation” for the volunteers at the Christian Women’s Job Corps of Middle Tennessee and the theme for the evening was set by St. Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians: Let us not e weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up (Gal. 6:9). By the time the program wrapped up, everyone in attendance was reminded of the plain truth that making...
Moyers/Beisner/Akin Kerfuffle
As noted here, last week PBS ran a special by Bill Moyers’, “Is God Green?” examining the “new” trend among evangelicals toward stewardship of the environment. Arguably what is “new” about this move is its coherence with liberal/leftist environmentalism. As also noted previously, “The munity for 5,000 years or more has taken its responsibility for the environment seriously. The whole concept of ‘stewardship’ is one es directly from sacred texts.” Stewardship isn’t new. Perhaps the method for stewardship proposed is....
From Edwards to Darwin, Abraham to Jesus
Two quick items: First, in unrelated projects, the works of Jonathan Edwards (HT: Reformation21) and Charles Darwin (HT: Slashdot) are set to be digitized and accessible online. Looks like the Darwin set plete, and the Edwards works are in public beta, with only the Miscellanies and sermons available as yet. And second, I’m headed to the exhibit, “From Abraham to Jesus,” tonight, called “the largest touring exhibit of sacred text, biblical art, and artifacts in history.” The tour opens in...
Faithfulness in Biblical Interpretation
I ran across the following quote from Søren Kierkegaard recently (HT: the evangelical outpost): The matter is quite simple. The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand we are obliged to act accordingly. Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act accordingly. My God, you will say,...
Power
Zenit published the following this weekend, mentary by Capuchin Father Raniero Cantalamessa on this Sunday’s liturgical readings (Isaiah 53:2a.,3a.,10-11; Hebrews 4:14-16; Mark 10:35-45). Well worth the read. After the Gospel on riches, this Sunday’s Gospel gives us Christ’s judgment on another of the great idols of the world: power. Power, like money, is not intrinsically evil. God describes himself as “the Omnipotent” and Scripture says “power belongs to God” (Psalm 62:11). However, given that man had abused the power granted...
The Catholicity of the Reformation: Musings on Reason, Will, and Natural Law, Part 4
As promised in Part 3, this post will begin a discussion of natural law in the thought of the Reformer Peter Martyr Vermigli (1499-1562), but first I want to touch on the broader issue of natural law in the context of Reformation theology. More than any other Reformer, John Calvin is appealed to for his insight on natural law. This is probably due to the stubborn persistence among scholars to single him out as the chief early codifier of Protestant...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved