I'm so bored with clickbait guy in our White House.
FYI. No. We're not replacing IRS with ERS, External Revenue Service, and tariffs. It's clickbait.
Who the Hell elected this guy? Jesus Wept...Putin Grins...along with Trump oligarchs and apparently a vast and ever growing kakistocracy.
Trump announced his intention to create an "External Revenue Service" (ERS) during his inauguration speech on January 20, 2025. The ERS is intended to collect tariffs, duties, and other revenues from foreign sources, aiming to shift the U.S. revenue system away from income taxes.
Following this announcement, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick stated that the administration's goal is to abolish the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and replace federal income taxes with revenue generated from tariffs.
Economists have expressed skepticism about the feasibility of this plan, noting that tariffs currently generate a small fraction of federal revenue and that relying solely on tariffs could lead to increased consumer prices and economic challenges.
Trump has proposed the creation of the ERS to replace the IRS and eliminate income taxes, but this plan faces significant economic and political obstacles.
This idea is economically unworkable and largely nonsense.
Here’s why:
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Tariffs Cannot Replace Income Tax Revenue – The U.S. federal government collects over $4.5 trillion annually in revenue, with over 50% coming from income taxes. Tariffs currently bring in only about $80 billion per year—a tiny fraction of what would be needed. Raising tariffs high enough to replace income tax would make imported goods unaffordable, hurt American businesses, and spark trade wars.
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Who Pays Tariffs? – Tariffs are not paid by foreign countries; they are paid by American consumers and businesses that import goods. So, instead of income tax, Americans would just be paying higher prices for everything, making this an indirect tax rather than a true abolition of taxation.
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Economic Consequences – Eliminating income tax while shifting entirely to tariffs would cripple the economy by:
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Increasing costs for consumers (inflation).
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Hurting businesses that rely on imported goods.
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Causing retaliation from other countries with tariffs on U.S. exports, harming American industries like agriculture and manufacturing.
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Creating massive budget deficits since tariffs wouldn’t generate nearly enough revenue to fund government services, including the military, Social Security, Medicare, and infrastructure.
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Political Impossibility – Even if Trump proposed this, it would require Congressional approval, which is extremely unlikely given the chaos it would cause.
This is classic clickbait populism—throwing out a radical-sounding idea that plays well with anti-tax rhetoric but has no basis in economic reality.
Compiled with aid of ChatGPT