Whether or not you agree with President Trump’s methods to drum up revenue to assist with the government’s balance of payments, economists largely welcome the fact that at least the White House is talking about deficits.
At the time of writing, the U.S. Treasury is sitting on debt worth just shy of $39 trillion, a pile accumulated under both the Republicans and Democrats. Both sides of the House have looked on, as interest payments to service that debt have soared to more than $1 trillion annually.
The second Trump administration has floated various methods to help rebalance the books: Tariffs were one, and “gold card” visas were another.
This time last year, the president outlined his plan to charge rich immigrants $5 million for a gold card—which has green card immigration privileges “plus a route to citizenship.” “A million cards would be worth $5 trillion, and if you sell 10 million of the cards that’s a total of $50 trillion,” Trump said last year. “Well, we have $35 trillion in debt, so that would be nice.”
He noted that he would have $15 trillion “left over” if he managed to sell 10 million cards, adding: “It may be earmarked for deficit reduction, but it actually could be more money than that.”
