Is the next wave of Stimulus Checks coming soon?
Perhaps.
But in this case it won’t be the Government printing money and giving it to you, it will be the Government RETURNING the money it stole from you with waste, fraud and abuse.
In other words, money that has been recovered by DOGE.
Elon Musk himself broke the news recently when he suggested he would ask President Trump about the idea:
BREAKING: DOGE head Elon Musk said he would ask President Donald Trump about a proposal for a “DOGE Dividend” that would give taxpayers a refund check of $5,000 funded by the savings from his Department of Government Efficiency.
— unusual_whales (@unusual_whales) February 19, 2025
According to reports, the “DOGE Dividend” would only be comprised of about 20% of the DOGE savings, with the remaining 80% applied towards paying down our national debt and balancing the budget:
The DOGE Dividend:
Elon Musk just said DOGE is considering sending $5,000 refund checks to US taxpayers.
This plan would send 79 MILLION households a total of ~$400 BILLION, which is 20% of DOGE's projected savings by 2026.
What does this mean? Let us explain.
(a thread) pic.twitter.com/T8XhunCnpF
— The Kobeissi Letter (@KobeissiLetter) February 19, 2025
While no one will hate getting a check for $5,000, I think Scott Adams has some good insight and warnings here, to which even Elon Musk himself replied and agreed with:
We need to balance the budget as first priority
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 19, 2025
You can watch more discussion here from Fox News:
BREAKING: 🚨 ELON MUSK & TRUMP DISCUSS ‘DOGE DIVIDEND’—$5,000 CHECKS FOR EVERY AMERICAN! 🚨
🔴 Elon Musk is proposing a groundbreaking plan to return government waste to the American people—through a $5,000 direct payment to taxpayers, funded by savings from the Department of… pic.twitter.com/DRCNmwWAgq
— Jim Ferguson (@JimFergusonUK) February 19, 2025
Here are more details, from CNBC:
Elon Musk said he’s going to touch base with President Donald Trump on a proposal to send Americans tax refund checks from money saved by the Department of Government Efficiency advisory group he heads.
In a post Tuesday on X, the Tesla
and SpaceX chief executive said he “Will check with the President.” The remark came in response to a separate post from James Fishback, CEO of the Azoria investment firm, suggesting that Trump has the opportunity to issue a so-called DOGE Dividend in the form of a tax refund check sent to U.S. households funded by savings created by DOGE’s cost-cutting campaign.Musk has said that his goal is to cut federal spending by $2 trillion, out of a $6.75 trillion annual budget in the latest fiscal year ended last Sept. 30. If that were met, Fishback suggests taking 20% of that, or $400 billion, and distributing it to taxpayers. That would amount to approximately $5,000 per household, he said.
“When a breach of this magnitude happens in the private sector, the counterparty, at minimum, refunds the customer since they failed to deliver what was promised,” Fishback wrote in his proposal. “It’s high time for the federal government to do the same, and refund money back to taxpayers given what DOGE has uncovered.”
Government stimulus checks mailed to millions of taxpayers in 2020 during the Covid pandemic bore Trump’s signature, the first time a president’s name appeared on any IRS payments, the Associated Press reported at the time.
ADVERTISEMENTAccording to DOGE, it has saved an estimated $55 billion through its efforts. However, recent reports suggest that the actual figure is likely far below that.
And now I want to leave you with two videos that I thought were excellent on the topic, both from my friend Kevin “MeetKevin” Paffrath.
I think these bring some unique insights and great analysis to the idea that everyone should be aware of.
First here:
FULL TRANSCRIPT:
Kevin: Hey, it’s me, Kevin. I just landed back from my check ride to become an instrument pilot, and I saw a notice that there are potentially talks that maybe the Doge team and Donald Trump could be in discussions to issue some kind of Doge refund to American taxpayers. This is really interesting because I’ve been studying a lot of what Doge has been doing—and what it hasn’t been doing. You know, I’m a big fan of cutting waste where there’s waste to be cut and a huge fan of transparency.
And so, this suggestion is a game changer. It changes everything because all of a sudden, what you’re doing is actually aligning Doge with what I think inspired Americans: the idea that what we save, we will help give back to you. Now, this has of course been confused in the media with the idea that the discretionary budget of the United States is only, you know, 20% or 25% of US government spending. Fifty percent goes to entitlement programs—which, I mean, we paid into them, so of course we’re entitled to them—and then about 25% goes to the military.
Then we’ve got discretionary funds, and some of those funds go toward paying for a good portion of our budget, including just paying for this unsustainable national debt we have. I think a big fear was that it wouldn’t be feasible to actually see real, meaningful cuts. I mean, look: you kill USAID—great, awesome—and, you know, kill all foreign aid. It amounts to a $196 refund, if you will, per person living in America—per citizen, or green card resident, or taxpayer, however you want to look at it.
ADVERTISEMENTThe difference is nominal; however, this suggestion about going deeper and saying, “Hey, you know what? We’ve actually taxed you too much, and now we’re going to try to find a way to get back to essentially a smaller form of government and, in exchange, give it back to American taxpayers in the form of a tax refund,” is actually quite brilliant. You see, government spending is almost intentionally wasteful. One of the reasons it’s so wasteful is because it actually becomes stimulative. If you’re getting showered—whether it’s an NGO or whatever government contract—government money is being spent without the government receiving full value for it.
Technically, that’s a deadweight loss because you’re taking $100 from you in taxes and giving it to the government, which then deficit spends $150, but maybe only $90 actually goes into GDP spending. That still amounts to a $90 stimulus, so they basically took a $90 stimulus check from you and gave it to somebody else. There is an inherent deadweight loss in government spending, and I’m not a proponent of zero government. From a capitalistic point of view—whether you’re a Keynesian or an Austrian—the bottom line is that, in capitalism, smaller government equals less deadweight loss.
Now, Keynesians argue that government intervention—and that deadweight loss—is, for some, worth it for the benefit of others. They suggest that perhaps the government can minimize, or put a lid on, an economic boom so you don’t get a bubble like in 2008 or 2005, and then stimulate during low times to minimize ups and downs. Austrians, on the other hand, say, “Nah, man, let the free market economy handle it,” and it’s fine. Both economic schools of thought are based on capitalism—not socialism, Marxism, or whatever.
But if you think of government spending—whether it’s for foreign aid, for some NGO, or for a frivolous government contract (like spending $150 on soap dispensers for the military)—that wasteful spending turns into stimulus in the form of corporate profits, share buybacks, and corporate executives getting rich, or even the people receiving the contracts and pay, or the government workers (some of whom obviously just can’t justify their existence or don’t do anything). Hopefully, that’s just a small minority, but who knows? I guess we’ll find out when we get more transparent details. Really, I believe this is a massive game changer because when you say, “Look, rather than taxing you $100, why don’t I just give you the hundred bucks back and then not tax you that $100 next year?”—in effect, you are not stimulating to the tune of $90 because you avoid that deadweight loss. Instead, you’re stimulating to the tune of $100, which could potentially grow the economy.
One concern that a lot of folks have—rightfully so—is that if government spending contributes over 47% of gross domestic product (GDP)—and, of course, consumers make up 70% of GDP—if government spending accounts for, say, 50% of GDP with a deadweight loss of 5% (or maybe even 10% because of government inefficiency), then returning that money to Americans could potentially boost spending by 5 or 10%. Instead of government facilitating 50% of GDP, they could be facilitating 60% of GDP. You could actually see a GDP explosion and an optimism boom because people would get taxed less and keep more of their own money.
This is something I can really get behind. I like the idea of cutting out rich suits in Silicon Valley who collect more from government cuts to line their own interests—like building those AI chip factories for us—and instead giving more stimulus to our government-contracted and supported entities that, frankly, make me feel like you’re robbing the core American—the person making ends meet by working their ass off while prices are going up, they’re frustrated, they’re pissed off, and they’re seeing crime go unpunished. So, this idea of a tax refund or tax stimulus—yes, some people will argue it’s going to be inflationary. And yeah, if it’s not measured properly, it could be inflationary.
But remember, I’m a believer that a lot of the inflation we had was because supply chains weren’t built out; they weren’t prepared for the volume of orders that came during COVID—especially when people were making money for doing nothing. What’s interesting is that now we have an oversupply of factories and businesses that are ready and willing to serve Americans with more money. It’s kind of like if you gained 500 pounds and then lost it all rapidly—you’d have some extra sag. Imagine that extra sag as extra production for the US economy; it fills up without necessarily expanding or inflating, because the flab just fills up again without expanding what’s already there.
Now, from an economic point of view, can we say that government creates deadweight loss? Yes. Can we say that the government would be better off taxing us less? Absolutely. Does that mean there shouldn’t be any regulations—like, should lenders be able to give people loans they can never afford? Should someone with no assets to secure a loan be eligible for a $50,000 or $100,000 personal loan if they make only $20,000 a year? By analogy, should students making $20,000 a year working at, say, Jamba or as a server be eligible for $50,000 to $100,000 in loans? I think not—I think that’s a scam.
If you have an asset and you’re leveraging it, that’s different. But there should be transparent disclosure; you shouldn’t have a loan that starts at 0% interest or even a negative interest rate that suddenly adjusts in the future and then you get foreclosed on when you can’t repay it—when the bank wants it back. That’s a scam, and it’s exactly why the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was created—to prevent that from happening. I do have some concerns that such practices could create a bubble of malinvestment and bad lending, but honestly, the free market does handle that. I mean, 2008 was an example of the free market correcting that problem, though it came with a lot of pain.
This is why Austrians say, “Nah, man, let the free market handle it,” and why Keynesians argue, “Nah, man, the free market is getting it all wrong.” And so this debate exists. To some extent, you could argue that the Obama Democrats—which I think are very different from some other Democrats—are level-headed and reasonable in this sense. I actually don’t think they’re extreme; they’re more of a “no, no, no, the government should be there to help, and we should cut around the edges when making cuts.” Then you have, on the other side, what now appears to be a more Musk-like approach: “Nah, man, just give the people their damn money back and stop wasting the damn money.” There are ups and downs to everything.
But the bottom line is this: this is truly the direction we’re going to go. This is a fantastic win for the American people, and frankly, it makes me very, very bullish on the future of the economy. This could be a GDP contributor in an era where it won’t necessarily be inflationary—depending on how it’s implemented. I mean, in 2021, I had to write a check for like $11 million in taxes. That was insane—just the tax check alone. I got taxed around 60%, thanks in part to California, but the federal government was responsible for 41% of the tax, and California for about 12.6%. The federal government took most of my money. I chose to live in California because of my wife and my seven children, and yeah, I gave them a little bit more.
Would it be stimulative? Could more people be hired and more businesses created if there were lower taxes? Absolutely. And if this comes back in the form of a refund, or just larger tax cuts in the future, count me in—I think this is wonderful. No, no—sorry, I didn’t get dressed up for this or anything. Honestly, I’m a little overwhelmed by how hard it was to study and get ready for my instrument check ride to become an instrument-rated pilot. This is a serious profession; it takes a lot of work and effort, but I am excited to be back.
ADVERTISEMENTLeave a comment down below: what kind of video would you like to see? Do you want to see some beginner finance videos, some real estate videos, or maybe next month—since I’m going to be flying again—do you want me to fly around some of our house-hack properties and do some videos on those? We could do that as well, or even just review Matterport scans from the studio. Let me know what you want to hear and see, and how I can help you out. Thank you so much for watching and supporting—I’ll see you all soon. Bye.
Second one here:
FULL TRANSCRIPT:
Hey, in this video I’d like to talk about this potential $5,000 Doge dividend and how it compares to previous stimulus checks. Elon Musk did just respond to this proposed Doge dividend, tax refund, or stimulus check—whatever you want to call it—and he said he’s going to talk to the president about the potential for a $5,000 check to go to taxpaying American households. This would be a little different than the previous stimulus checks, which were provided on a per-person basis. Remember, we had stimulus check number one that was $1,200 in payments plus $500 per child, costing about $271 billion.
Stimulus check number two gave $600 per adult and $600 per child and cost about $141 billion. Then stimulus check number three provided $1,400 per adult and $1,400 per child, costing $401 billion. This new check would be sent to each taxpaying household, and it’s unclear exactly how they’ll calculate what qualifies as a taxpaying household. You’ll probably see somewhere between 79 to 90 million households eligible. It would likely cost around $350 to $500 billion.
A lot of folks are arguing that this is fine—you’re really just returning some of the money that Doge is saving to taxpayers. Some people look at this and say, “Hey, I don’t want the check; just pay down the nation’s debt.” Others are like, “No, man, give the dividend to the Americans who voted for these cuts to bureaucratic spending and whatever waste Elon can find—either pay down the debt, send some back, or just cut taxes.” The argument with a $5,000 potential refund is that it would only be about 20% of what Doge is planning on saving through the Department of Governmental Efficiency, and the rest could then go to lowering taxes or paying down the debt.
On one hand, people argue that only some of it is going back to you in the form of a tax refund—which could be stimulative, of course—and that drives inflation concerns. Yesterday, I talked about those inflation concerns, so watch my video from yesterday if you want to see my thoughts on what would happen with inflation. So far, you have another cohort responding by saying, “Look, Doge right now has claimed that they’re saving $55 billion.” The problem with that is they’ve only provided receipts for about $16 billion in savings. I personally think that’s still a pretty good start—$16.6 billion times 12, if you annualize it, is about $200 billion of savings for the entire year.
That, though, is a far cry from even paying for these $5,000 refund checks. Then the question is, are they cutting linearly? In other words, can they continue to cut $16 to $50 billion a month, or are they just cutting the low-hanging fruit? They saved $16.6 billion, and even if they save $40 billion by the end of the year, that’s a fraction of our government’s $4 trillion in expenditures—in fact, it works out to just 1% if they get to $40 billion. And again, that’s only 10% of the cost of these potential $5,000 checks, so you really have some financing problems that are probably going to brew up with Congress.
Of course, Congress right now is focused on the Trump tax plan, which is fascinating because it actually enables you to raise the debt rather than pay it down. Trump is currently encouraging a $4.5 trillion tax cut plan to be passed in the House of Representatives, which contrasts with the Senate’s desire to do a smaller funding bill. The Senate’s approach seems to be to kick the can down the road—address immigration later or pass a bigger bill later—while Trump really wants the big, beautiful bill because it gives him the tax cuts he’s trying to provide to Americans. I think a lot of Americans voted for tax cuts, but let’s think about the numbers on this tax bill for a moment.
The larger bill would increase America’s ability to borrow by $4 trillion, enable about $2 trillion in spending cuts, and provide about $4.5 trillion in tax cuts. If we do the math on that, the government is receiving $4.5 trillion less money over, say, a 10-year period. Even if you add $2 trillion of spending cuts, we’re still in the hole by $2.5 trillion. So far, the math on the big, beautiful bill actually increases our debt by about $25 trillion, which is why they’re including an increase of the debt ceiling by $4 trillion. People think that we’re just going to have these government shutdown debates over and over unless we have a big extension of the debt ceiling. With Republicans in control right now, they feel they can push through this extension and then not worry about a fight after the midterms when it might be harder to pass the debt ceiling again.
So far, the numbers we’re seeing don’t really justify being able to get that $55,000 Doge dividend per household, because the numbers that Doge is claiming—saving $55 billion—are disputed. Their website shows about $55 billion claimed, but receipts only add up to about $16.6 billion. Even if they did save $55 billion and gave all of it back to households, that would be around $800 per household. There are also disputes over an $8 million versus $8 billion contract cut, which adds to the debate about the actual savings. Even if they cut the full $55 billion, it’s not enough to really get more than an $800 household check, even if they gave 100% of those savings back to Americans.
And so far, the big, beautiful bill will probably end up increasing the debt rather than reducing it. While there is a lot of excitement and enthusiasm—and I’m excited and enthusiastic about more government waste being cut—there are concerns about whether we’re cutting in the right places. For example, we just heard that over the weekend, 400 probationary workers at the FAA were fired. Fortunately, they were not in air traffic control or aviation safety inspection roles, but they were FAA workers, and frankly, the entire FAA has to do with aviation and safety. It’s curious exactly where they came from.
This comes at the same time that Donald Trump is potentially planning to announce 25% tariffs on certain cars, pharmaceuticals, and ships coming April 2nd. I don’t think people really believe those tariffs are coming—most of the time, I just see the market buying the dip on the idea that this tariff drama is going on. It kind of reminds me of 2018, when it was logical to buy the dip on tariff drama, because it gave you an excuse to find a sale. Mostly, there just don’t seem to be any major negative catalysts in the market or the economy right now—things are pretty good. That doesn’t mean there can’t be a big Black Swan event that causes a major crisis, but it is fascinating.
So, when we put all of this together, what are the odds right now of getting some kind of Doge dividend? I would say it’s possible to get some form of Doge dividend, probably closer to the end of the year. I think it might be something that actually gets included in the big, beautiful bill—if we’re going to raise the debt ceiling by $4 trillion anyway. Some people argue that you could do a $2.5 trillion tax cut plan and throw a Doge refund in there. Even though you’re not cutting the full $500 billion or whatever it would cost to do a Doge dividend, it might get you votes for the midterms. Maybe those refunds go out around April of 2026, right before the midterms, and of course, they’d be branded with the Trump Administration signature.
It will be really interesting to see what happens, but we’ve seen stimulus checks purposefully timed around elections many times before—even Newsom did that just weeks before a recall election, sending stimulus to those making over $500,000. That was called the Inflation Relief Stimulus Check in California, and it probably ended up causing quite a bit of inflation. Anyway, this is the latest we have on the Doge dividend and the Trump tax plan. We have some information coming out—mostly from some bickering about Zalinski in terms of Trump and some other news.
For instance, Trump is apparently calling Zalinski a dictator and an okay comedian, while Zalinski is countering by saying that Trump lives in a disinformation bubble and that Russia is winning the disinformation war. Trump argues back that Zalinski has been negotiating for three years with nothing to show for it, so he shouldn’t blame Trump for trying to negotiate with Russia in Saudi Arabia. Even though Ukraine wasn’t initially invited, now they are—but Ukraine says they don’t want to go because they don’t want to give legitimacy to the event. There’s a lot of drama.
With that said, it’s also possibly worth your time watching the Trump and Musk Hannity interview. It’s kind of interesting to see the president get interviewed with Elon Musk. Trump calls Elon Musk a brilliant man, and Musk says Trump is a good man—that he’s never seen him do anything cruel or bad. Elon Musk ultimately has visions of wanting to die on Mars, just not on impact, ideally. And Trump says that Musk is helping him actually ensure that executive orders get implemented. He’s right—executive orders can be issued, but their implementation often fades, with little follow-up. Musk, or rather Trump, says that Musk is there to help enforce that these executive orders are happening.
I think as long as we can continue to get more transparency, the trend is in the right direction of saving money. It’ll be really interesting to see how everything develops in terms of actually creating tangible savings that are large enough to help pay down the debt—especially since now we’re talking about increasing the debt ceiling rather than decreasing it. That’s the latest for you. Thank you so much for watching, and I’ll see you in the next one. Goodbye, and good luck.
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