House Republicans and President Trump are trying to jam through a disastrous tax bill in the coming days. If passed, this extreme legislation would take a sledgehammer to lifesaving programs and tax credits that create jobs and provide healthcare, food assistance, and affordable clean energy to everyday Americans.
Make no mistake: The GOP’s bill is designed to give massive tax breaks to billionaires by taking money out of the pockets of everyday Americans. Here are seven ways the Republicans’ sweeping tax bill is expected to drive up costs and eliminate economic opportunities for average Americans.
7 Ways Republicans' Tax Bill Will Drive Up Household Costs
1. Transportation Costs
Impact on Households: This bill will raise the price of gasoline by 37 cents per gallon—over $200 per year for the average gas vehicle. Costs for new electric vehicles will go up by $7,500, plus a $250 annual fee.
Republicans will increase oil demand by eliminating federal electric vehicle (EV) affordability programs, fuel economy standards, and tailpipe emission standards. Decreased efficiency and increased demand for gasoline will raise costs for everyone. Republicans are also repealing incentives for EVs, raising the price of new EVs by $7,500 and used EVs by $4,000. So, whether you drive a gas-powered or electric car, Republicans are jacking your costs up.
2. Household Energy Bills
Impact on Households: Republicans are raising electricity costs for American households by more than $110 next year (2026).
That’s according to analysis from the Clean Energy Buyers Association, modeling the GOP's de facto repeal of clean energy tax credits in the bill. Meanwhile, the latest modeling from Rhodium Group also finds that energy costs for American households could rise by as much as 7 percent—that’s $290—in 2035.
At a time when Americans are already struggling to keep up with high electricity and gas utility bills, it is outrageous that Republicans would rip away programs that would drive those costs down (PDF). As electricity demand continues to grow, clean energy is the fastest and most affordable way to get more power on the grid. If Republicans cared about driving down energy costs, this is the last thing they would do.
3. Gas Bills
Impact on Households: Households could pay $100 more by 2050 if Republicans rubberstamp an unconstrained amount of liquefied “natural” gas (LNG) exports.
The Republican bill allows corporations to simply cut a check to declare their LNG exports in the "public interest," practically guaranteeing more gas exports. But recent studies from the Department of Energy project that unconstrained LNG exports could cost the average household an additional $100 per year by 2050. These rising costs would also extend to electricity generation and manufacturing.
4. Home Energy Efficiency Upgrades
Impact on Households: Hoping to save money by making your home more efficient? The GOP is making that more expensive, too.
Right now, households can leverage the Energy Efficient Home Improvement Tax Credit (25C) for home improvements like heat pumps or water heaters, saving up to $990 each year on utility bills. But the GOP’s bill eliminates the Energy Efficient Home Improvement Tax Credit at the end of this year.
5. Insurance and Housing Damages
Impact on Households: Insurance premiums will skyrocket, and people will lose their homes due to the worsening climate crisis.
The clean energy tax credits and other historic programs in the Inflation Reduction Act were designed to drive down climate pollution. But the GOP’s law would increase climate pollution and functionally repeal much of the largest climate investment package in U.S. history.
Climate change already poses a serious threat to housing markets: New analysis from First Street predicts insurance premiums will rise drastically and that foreclosures caused by extreme weather linked to climate change could spike by 380 percent in the next ten years, meaning hundreds of thousands more people could lose their homes. Repealing clean energy tax credits that are key to slashing climate pollution would only heighten the financial risk to homeowners caused by increased fires, floods, and skyrocketing premiums.
6. Groceries
Impact on Households: The GOP is trying to cut $300 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which currently helps over 42 million people across the country afford groceries.
Republicans are taking a wrecking ball to the nation’s largest anti-hunger program (PDF). These drastic cuts would result in people losing food assistance and push many additional households into hunger. It comes right as families are struggling with already high prices for groceries.
7. Health Care and Medicaid Access
Impact on Households: The GOP will kick an estimated 10.3 million people off their health coverage and leave 7.6 million Americans uninsured, raising costs for everyone.
That’s according to recent data from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO). In what would amount to the largest Medicaid cut in the program’s history, the GOP is pushing to deny coverage to millions of Americans by imposing burdensome, bureaucratic reporting rules, stricter, more onerous work requirements, and new eligibility restrictions. When people go uninsured, it raises health care costs for everyone, as hospitals try to recoup costs from those who can’t pay. In short, the reignited Republican war on healthcare would devastate millions of families across the country.
Further Harms to Households
Environmental Injustices
Impact on Households: More local air pollution means 350 additional premature deaths each year, and nearly 670 by 2035.
That’s according to the latest analysis from Energy Innovation (PDF), which finds that the GOP’s sweeping tax bill will worsen both climate and air pollution, particularly from power plants and vehicles. The bill also gets rid of key pollution monitoring programs, including those located in communities near polluting facilities and schools in low-income and disadvantaged communities. Cutting these programs means we lose vital tools to measure the pollution poisoning our communities, effectively hindering our ability to act. It's a green light for corporations to continue their long history of disproportionately harming communities of color and low-income communities, unchecked and unchallenged.
This tax bill will worsen the climate crisis, particularly for low-income communities. The costs of extreme weather and other climate-related harms are disproportionately leveled at working-class households, who typically have the fewest financial resources to respond to its devastating impacts.
Job Loss
Impact on Households: This Republican bill is a job killer, costing 830,000 American jobs in 2030.
As the GOP agenda drives prices higher across the country, hundreds of thousands of families will be hit with a second economic blow. New modeling from Energy Innovation (PDF) finds that the GOP’s tax bill would cost more than 830,000 American jobs in 2030 compared to current policy. Even this figure is a conservative estimate because passing this bill is likely to lead many companies to cancel clean energy manufacturing projects that are already underway.
This Is the Big Bill for Billionaires
On the campaign trail, Trump promised to cut prices and help the middle class. Instead, he’s trying to strip cost-saving programs and family-sustaining jobs to fund nearly $90,000 annually in tax giveaways for people making over $1 million per year (PDF). The GOP’s sweeping tax bill appears designed to make life more expensive and less secure for average Americans, especially those living near or below the poverty line. Let’s be clear: Republicans have engineered a massive wealth transfer to corporate polluters and the top 0.1 percent, exposing their true agenda—crony capitalism that rewards the rich and punishes everyone else.
