President-Elect Trump has announced his cabinet picks and other key positions, accompanied by a lot of talk about how they will dismantle the “deep state” and increase the authority of the president to get rid of regulations and reduce the autonomy of independent agencies like the Federal Communications Commission, Securities and Exchange Commission, or Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, consolidating his power. Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., nominated for Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, has promised to fire many federal employees who he claims defer too much to private industry.   

But there are many warning signs that private business interests will have significant sway in the incoming Trump administration. Federal civil servants operate within established regulatory authority to inspect pharmaceutical plants, food processing facilities, and other industrial sites. They are charged with monitoring safety for workers and for the public.  Massive firings of federal workers will strangle the capacity of government to monitor the private sector, and public safety will suffer. Drug companies will press for faster approval of their products, with fewer regulations and personnel to slow them down. 

The Washington Post reported last May that in a meeting with oil company executives, Trump sought $1 billion in contributions to his campaign and that he would, as president, roll back regulations they oppose, including those favoring electric vehicles and wind power. He may or may not have gotten that much from them, but the climate change-doubting, pro-fracking Trump nominees are intent on providing plenty of advantages for fossil fuel companies. 

The tariffs Trump threatens to impose are another opportunity to favor the new administration’s friends.  In the first Trump term, companies sought many thousands of exemptions from the tariffs imposed then. A recent study of Trump tariff exemptions, as reported in The New York Times, found that “an increase in past contributions to Republicans raised the likelihood of a company’s receiving an exemption.” It further found that when companies donated to Democrats, they were less likely to be exempted. 

The incoming administration and Republicans in Congress want to prevent tax breaks from expiring and to enact new ones. Corporate interests and the rich are lining up to benefit from these breaks. The richest 1 percent (with incomes $914,900 or higher) will see an average tax reduction of $36,320 if the full Trump tax package is adopted, according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.  Corporate tax reductions would be huge.   

The Coalition on Human Needs’ Human Needs Watch of November 15 spelled out these and other winners and losers under Trump proposals. The winners are corporations and wealthy individuals.  The losers are pretty much everyone else.   

People will lose the protections of environmental, public health, and consumer regulations, if the Trump administration has its way. While everyone, rich and poor alike, stand to lose because of the loss of these protections, it is clear that people of modest means will lose the most. Their homes are nearest sites needing environmental clean-up, or most vulnerable to climate-related disasters. They need access to vaccines through Medicaid or CHIP; will the vaccine skeptics expected to take control stop these programs from offering free vaccines? They will pay more for products that are subject to tariffs; no one will exempt them. 

And of course Elon Musk’s and Vivek Ramaswamy’s new hobby, the Department of Government Efficiency, will attempt to slash federal programs and employees. To the extent they succeed, services like Medicaid, SNAP, child care, low-cost housing, and so much more will be cut, while corporations will benefit from lower tax rates and fewer regulatory constraints.