Everyone in my public school third-grade class learned arithmetic. Apparently, this puts us way ahead of Donald Trump and much of the punditry. They somehow take seriously the idea that we can replace $2.6 trillion in annual income tax revenue with $280 billion in Donald Trump tariff revenue. My third-grade class all know better.
While this is absurd on its face, Donald Trump keeps repeating the idea. He draws approving nods from Republican politicians and the conservative punditry.
The arithmetic here is straightforward. We currently are running annual budget deficits of around $1.7 trillion, a bit less than 6.0 percent of GDP. The deficit, measured as a share of GDP, is projected to rise gradually over the next decade as the growing debt leads to a larger interest burden.
This is the context in which Donald Trump is saying that he wants to replace the income tax with his tariffs. This is the story on the relative size of the two taxes.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/12/02/trump-crazy-27542-replacing-the-income-tax-with-tariffs