Some Bribes, as a Treat

The classic strategy: Any parent knows bribery is the path to compliance. And President Donald Trump appears to be applying this concept to the voting public.

“Because we’ve done so well, and because our country is making so much money, that—only I can make this promise to you, and here is my promise—if the Republicans win the House of Representatives and the United States Senate, both of them, because of our economic, tremendous economic success…I will issue a dividend to every adult citizen in the United States of America for $5,000,” he said at the Republican National Committee’s midterm convention last night. This would cost more than $1 trillion.

The asterisk is that this money would need to be spent in the United States, according to the president. (It’s not clear how this would be enforced.)

On principle, this type of bribery is wrong: Politicians should be pitching policy that can improve our lives (ideally by getting government out of the way wherever necessary, and limiting it to its most essential functions), not promising handouts. (Democrats have, of course, been playing the promising-handouts game for a long time, especially since the Bernie Sanders wing of the party shifted toward universal everything and away from means testing.)

But also, our national debt hit $40 trillion for the first time ever last month. We simply can’t afford this. Although politicians from both major parties seem to believe the bill will never come due, that’s not true: Servicing the massive interest on our debt has become a bigger and bigger line item in our budget that crowds out other spending. This will only become worse the larger the debt grows. Investors might lose confidence, over time, in the U.S. government’s ability to pay back the debt, and it’s also likely that future taxpayers will have to shoulder the burden of our current spending. It’s a bad situation, and one that neither party in its current form seems equipped to dial back.

Consider, too, that if Trump actually made good on this promise, it would be likely to have an inflationary effect, entering the economy all at once. But Trump can’t get the idea out of his head that he needs to bribe Americans. Back when Elon Musk was tackling Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) cuts (which ended up being relatively minimal in terms of cost savings), Trump publicly toyed with the idea of returning that money to the American public via a “DOGE dividend.” In that situation, it wasn’t the absolute worst impulse to say hey taxpayers, let’s return some of the money we collected from you. But there has to be an eye toward the U.S. government’s broader financial picture, which I would characterize as pretty bad.

since becoming president again, Trump has promised:
-$5000 stimulus checks via “DOGE dividend”
-$2000 stimulus checks via “tariff dividend”
-$1000+ checks via “savings” from expiring ACA subsidies
-$5000 “dividend” if Rs win midterms
no checks have been issued https://t.co/aJaUN79WPe

— Catherine Rampell (@crampell) September 10, 2026

Of course, part of Trump’s overall pitch last night was that our economy’s doing great, and to the extent that it’s doing poorly in any area, it’s the Democrats who are to blame. “I’m bringing the prices way down,” he said. Democrats “caused it”—meaning high prices—”but we’re fixing it.” Gas prices are “going down as soon as we win the war with Iran.” This stood in stark contrast to other Republicans’ pitches—that high inflation and cost-of-living issues are, in fact, a problem.

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Scenes from New York: “The city has announced that A.I. cannot be used in elementary and middle school and has set limits on digital devices,” writes James Barron for The New York Times. “But enforcement guidelines are unclear.” Details of the policy within.

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QUICK HITS

• “The rush of data center construction has fueled a potent bipartisan backlash across the country this year, creating unusual political alliances ahead of the November midterms. Democrats hope the anger will weaken Republicans among some of their most reliable rural voters. Republicans are betting that although those voters may dislike data centers, they are not ready to abandon the party over them,” reports The New York Times. “The stakes are particularly high in Texas, home to more data centers than any other state except Virginia and where Republicans face the biggest political threat to their statewide dominance in years.”
• Anthropic has shared an interactive model with the public that projects how AI deployment might affect the whole economy. In the extreme scenarios, it looks like knowledge workers lose out most of all:

Anthropic’s Economics team is sharing a new model of how AI might affect economic growth, jobs, wages, and more by 2030.

Explore the scenarios, tell us what you think will happen, and see how your answers compare to more than 10,000 Americans. https://t.co/AvQlEZNxR0

— Anthropic (@AnthropicAI) September 9, 2026

• “Social-media influencers Andrew and Tristan Tate were denied bail Wednesday as they fight potential extradition to the U.K. on charges of rape and sex trafficking,” reports The Wall Street Journal. “U.S. Magistrate Judge Lauren Louis in Miami said the brothers failed to establish that they are entitled to be released from detention while the proceedings are ongoing. The judge raised concerns that the brothers were a flight risk and said there were no special circumstances that warranted their release.”
• The European Central Bank is raising interest rates due to inflation woes.
• Last night, a democratic socialist named David Morales won the Democratic primary for mayor of Providence, Rhode Island. “A victory for Morales, 27, in November would make him the latest democratic socialist to lead a U.S. city,” reports The Washington Post. “New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson, both democratic socialists, took office this year, and Janeese Lewis George is favored to become mayor of Washington, D.C., next year.” Not good!

The post Some Bribes, as a Treat appeared first on Reason Magazine.

Source: https://reason.com/2026/09/10/some-bribes-as-a-treat/