President Trump proposed a $5,000 "Trump dividend" for every American adult if Republicans hold Congress in the midterms, and his own regular panel of economists on Kudlow does not want it.
Trump built his entire midterm-convention speech around growth, tax cuts and a line about patriotism — and then handed the media a different story to cover. Host Larry Kudlow's own economists spent the segment trying to drag the conversation back to the growth numbers.
"I think this too will go nowhere."
Steve Moore co-founded Unleashed Prosperity and advises Trump on economic policy; Douglas Holtz-Eakin ran the Congressional Budget Office and now heads the American Action Forum; Liz Peek is a Fox News contributor and a columnist for The Hill.
I listened to the full segment so you can skip it.
Here are the 7 arguments that matter.
👤 Guests: Steve Moore, co-founder of Unleashed Prosperity and an economic adviser to President Trump; Liz Peek, Fox News contributor and columnist for The Hill; and Douglas Holtz-Eakin, president of the American Action Forum and a former director of the Congressional Budget Office
🎙️ Host: Larry Kudlow, former Director of the National Economic Council under the first Trump administration
📰 Published: 10 September 2026 on Fox Business, and on the Kudlow podcast feed
🟣 Apple Podcasts | ⏱️ 46 min
Key Takeaways
Trump's $5,000 dividend would cost roughly $1.2 trillion, with no plan to pay for it
The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget put the number on Kudlow's own reporting; a similar 2018 proposal went nowhere
Kudlow called it a pure demand-side rebate with no supply-side incentive to work or invest
He said it would actually reward not working, and that requiring the money be spent domestically is unenforceable
Moore's pitch: sell the same $5,000 as a growth dividend, not a check
Real median income is already up $2,000 this term, on top of a $6,000 gain in Trump's first term
Holtz-Eakin says the real tax story is pass-through businesses, not individual brackets
More than half of business and individual returns are filed as pass-throughs
Moore wants capital gains indexed to inflation, calling it popular and pro-growth
The Cato Institute put Medicare for All and a broader socialist takeover at $200 trillion over 10 years
Moore said funding that would take an 80% to 90% tax rate
Holtz-Eakin's verdict: Trump didn't quite make the sale, and needs a "Reaganesque" explanation of how markets work
Moore agreed the dividend knocked the growth message off track
1. The Unwanted $5K Dividend
Fox's Edward Lawrence reported live from the White House that the administration is returning roughly $500 per person to about a million people in what it calls overcharged Affordable Care Act fees from the Biden administration, and that Trump had floated a further $5,000-per-adult dividend if Republicans win the House and Senate in November.
Trump made the pitch directly to the Dallas crowd: "Because of your great work in our tremendous economic success as I said we are going to give the Trump dividend of $5000 if we win. We are going to win. We will make all Trump tax cuts permanent so the Democrats cannot end them"
Lawrence reported the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget priced the plan at about $1.2 trillion, with no detail from the President on how to pay for it
Kudlow did the arithmetic himself on air. "Roughly 245 million adults, according to the 2024 census data. At 5000 bucks a throat that is a bit more than 1.2 trillion dollars worth"
He argued the design undercuts the rest of Trump's own economic message. A one-time rebate carries no incentive to work, invest, or move to a higher-paying job, and could reward not working; the requirement to spend it in the United States is unenforceable, in his view
He noted the precedent. A similar rebate surfaced before the 2018 midterms and went nowhere; Kudlow expects the same outcome this time
Steve Moore agreed with the criticism directly: "I do not like the $5000 checks being sent out either"
Douglas Holtz-Eakin added his own objection: "I'll add my voice to those who were not a fan"
2. Sell It as a Growth Dividend
Moore's counter-pitch was to keep the $5,000 figure but attach it to growth policy instead of a check.
He cited the actual income gains instead. "So far this term real median income is up another $2000." That builds on a roughly $6,000 rise in real median income — income at the exact middle of the distribution — during Trump's first term
His proposed reframe: "Why not say my economic growth policies will give you a growth dividend for $5000?"
Liz Peek offered a softer read of the original comment, suggesting Trump may have meant the dividend more loosely — as a stand-in for the income gains voters could see from his broader policies — than as a literal $5,000 check
3. The Pass-Through Story
Kudlow asked Holtz-Eakin what a real tax-reform package would look like instead of the rebate.
Holtz-Eakin said the standard mantra — lower the rates, broaden the base — still applies, but that the more important point is who actually pays under the current code
More than half of business tax filings are pass-throughs, taxed on individual rather than corporate returns, which means a plan framed as "individual" tax reform is also small-business tax reform
Kudlow agreed that small businesses filing through individual income tax are the ones who would benefit most from the kind of bracket simplification the panel wanted Trump to talk about instead
4. Indexing Capital Gains
Moore raised a specific policy ask he said Kudlow has pushed on the show before.
His case: taxing inflation-driven gains isn't fair to the investor. Capital gains taxes currently apply to the whole nominal gain, including the portion that is just inflation, not real appreciation
He argued indexing gains to inflation is popular with voters, would help the broader economy, and would make housing more affordable
Kudlow agreed on air: "That's right it's not fair for people to pay tax on Joe Biden's inflation"
5. The $200T Socialism Bill
Kudlow raised a Cato Institute estimate of what a full Medicare for All and broader government takeover of the economy would cost.
Kudlow cited the Cato Institute's work on the Democratic left's platform. "200 trillion, not billion, trillion. That is over 10 years"
Moore backed the direction of the number. "That would require not 20% 30% or 10% it would be 80% or 90% tax rate to pay for that"
Kudlow said he expects other think tanks to publish their own versions of the estimate, and wants candidates talking about it more directly
6. Manufacturing and Jobs Boom
Kudlow pivoted to what he called the real story under the noise: a broad-based hiring and construction boom.
He played Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent's own convention remarks. "The private sector has added over a million jobs. U.S. manufacturing is roaring back, roaring back at its fastest pace in years. Companies are investing trillions to build and expand across the United States." Bessent added that, as in Trump's first term, lower-income earners are seeing the largest wage gains
Kudlow cited the Atlanta Fed's tracking estimate of growth above a 4% pace, alongside continued hiring
He framed data-center construction as a jobs story for organized labor, arguing that unions like the electrical workers are backing the buildout even as Democrats, in his telling, want to slow the sector down
Edward Lawrence separately reported that real wages, adjusted for inflation, are up 0.6% under Trump so far, against a 1.4% real decline over the prior administration's four years
7. Did He Make the Sale?
Kudlow closed by asking each panelist to grade the speech as a whole.
Holtz-Eakin's verdict was mixed. "I don't think he quite made the sale he gets another shot and I think he needs it." He added that the pitch got "muddied by the $5000 so called dividend"
His prescription was more teaching, less selling. He said what's missing is "a Reaganesque explanation to those who are somehow unfamiliar with how markets work" and why low marginal rates and market-driven decisions matter
Moore's take matched Holtz-Eakin's on the diagnosis. "I loved 80% of the speech," but said the $5,000 dividend line knocked the growth message off track and generated a wave of press calls asking only about the rebate
Peek argued the underlying "America belongs to those who love it" framing, plus the individual tax cuts on tips and overtime Trump wants made permanent, gave Republicans a workable growth-and-patriotism message if they can keep the rebate from swallowing it
Bonus Insights
Kudlow's own riff before the panel argued the far-left, socialist wing of the Democratic coalition doesn't love America the way Trump's convention line described. He said its animating force includes antisemitism and a desire to eliminate the state of Israel, and argued that kind of bigotry historically extends from Jews to Catholics, Black Americans, Hispanics and Asians alike — his own opinion, delivered as commentary rather than reporting
Trump used the same convention speech to attack specific midterm opponents. In a clip Kudlow played, Trump named North Carolina's Roy Cooper over a record on releasing prisoners and Michigan's Abdul El Sayed over a pledge to expand the Supreme Court, calling both part of "the most extreme and dangerous group of candidates" Democrats have nominated
Kudlow's own bottom line is that Trump has a strong growth and manufacturing story to run on in the midterms, and that the $5,000 dividend is the one part of his pitch his own economists think should be dropped.
Products, Companies & Tools Mentioned
Unleashed Prosperity (Steve Moore's organization, co-founded to push pro-growth tax policy)
American Action Forum (Douglas Holtz-Eakin's think tank)
Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (Priced Trump's $5,000 dividend proposal at roughly $1.2 trillion)
Cato Institute (Put the cost of Medicare for All and a broader government takeover of the economy at $200 trillion over 10 years)
The Hill (Where Liz Peek is a columnist)
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