Ideas

Trump Is a Degrowther

What else do you call a strategy designed to raise prices and lower productivity?

First published in The Atlantic on August 9, 2025

by Annie Lowrey, The Atlantic

August 21, 2025 | reading time: 6 Min.

In the past few weeks, Americans learned that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. canceled half a billion dollars of government investment in the development of mRNA vaccines, Las Vegas saw a 7 percent drop in visitors, residential electricity prices shot up by an average of 6.5 percent, the number of housing permits issued hit their lowest point in half a decade, employers quit adding workers, the manufacturing sector shrank, and inflation rose..