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Proposed DOGE dividend bill could become law in the ‘next few days’

February 28, 2025 | | Print Article

The young hedge fund manager who came up with the DOGE Dividend idea has begun speaking to lawmakers about making it a reality.

“The proposed bill will be coming in the next few days,” hedge fund manager James Fishback, 28, told the New York Post.

According to his proposal, American households that pay more in taxes than they receive in benefits would be entitled to 20 percent of all the money the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) winds up saving via its ongoing cuts.

Assuming Fishback’s math checks out, this means almost 80 million households would receive a $5,000 check, were DOGE to hit boss Elon Musk’s goal of cutting $2 trillion in waste.

When Fishback first proposed the idea earlier this month, he argued it’d incentivize more people to join the labor force so that they too can earn money back.

“President Trump’s DOGE Dividend will work to increase labor force participation by requiring individuals to be net payers of federal income tax to be eligible to receive their DOGE Dividend check,” he wrote in a document seen below. “As just one example, 7 million working-age men in America are neither working nor looking for work.”

“The prospect of a $5,000 DOGE Dividend in 2026 will incentivize many to re-enter the labor force in 2025 in order to be eligible for the DOGE Dividend. Low labor force participation is throttling U.S. economic growth,” he added.

Look:

Fishback also alleged that the DOGE Dividend would right the wrong done to taxpayers and “boost tax morale.”

“President Trump’s DOGE Dividend can work to increase tax receipts by boosting tax morale,” he wrote. “Tax morale, in the political science literature, is a measure of taxation sentiment – whether tax payers feel they are receiving adequate value in exchange for their tax payments.”

“The literature has found that tax morale is directly linked to public trust in public-facing “output government organizations that implement and deliver public goods to the citizenry. The federal government has undermined this trust by neglecting American citizens at home and funding boondoggles in distant lands instead. President Trump has a historic opportunity to restore this trust by refunding taxpayers for the breach of contract perpetrated against them,” he added.

Ever since he proposed the idea, leftist media outlets have been pushing back by claiming the DOGE Dividend would be inflationary just like the COVID stimulus payments.

“[T]he payout threatens to re-heat the US economy at a time when inflation has remained stubbornly above the Federal Reserve’s ideal target of 2% – it rose to 3% in January, the highest level since June 2024,” CNN reported on the 20th.

But according to Fishback, that’s a huge difference between the COVID stimulus checks and the potential DOGE Dividend checks.

“DOGE Dividend checks are exclusively funded with DOGE-driven savings, unlike COVID stimulus checks which were deficit-financed,” he explained in his document. “DOGE Dividend checks are sent only to tax-paying householders, who have a demonstrated propensity to save (not spend) the incremental dollar received.”

“In fact, according to a 2019 CNBC survey, 7 in 10 (71%) of Americans who unexpectedly received a $5,000 bonus would either ‘pay off debt,’ ‘save it for short-term expenditures or emergencies’ or ‘invest…in long- term goals like college or retirement.’ There is nothing inflationary about paying off debt, saving for emergencies, or investing in college or retirement,” he added.

Vivek Saxena
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