Michael Cohen - Trump's Arithmetic of Make-Believe
I’ve said it so many times over the years that it’s practically stitched into my DNA: numbers don’t lie—people do. I learned that lesson the hard way, sitting in boardrooms where confidence mattered more than competence and bravado routinely substituted for balance sheets. Which is why listening to this administration talk about tariff revenue feels less like economic policy and more like a rerun of a familiar con—one I recognize because I used to help sell it.
We are now deep into the era of what Trump calls the tariff shelf. You’ve heard about it. It’s apparently stocked with trillions upon trillions of dollars—so many, in fact, that the number changes depending on who’s holding the microphone. One day the President says it’s $23 trillion. The next, $29 trillion. Sometimes it’s a mere $2 trillion. Then, miraculously, overnight, it’s $3 trillion. No explanation. No accounting. Just a bigger number, delivered with a straight face and the expectation that no one will ask where it came from or, more importantly, where it’s being kept.
If this shelf exists, it seems to operate under its own laws of physics—one where money multiplies when spoken aloud and disappears the moment anyone asks to see a receipt.
But here’s where the math emphatically does matter: actual tariff revenue. Let’s do the numbers, because someone has to. Government data show that tariff collections—customs duties—do produce real money, yes, but nowhere near the fantastical scale implied by the administration’s talking points. Hundreds of billions collected through 2025 sounds impressive until you stack it against the trillions they keep citing. Peak months brought in over $30 billion, early months under $10 billion, and total receipts may reach roughly $300 billion by year’s end. That’s less than a third of a trillion. Not one trillion. Not two. Not 29. Even one trillion? Still a fantasy.
https://www.meidasplus.com/p/trumps-arithmetic-of-make-believe
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