President Trump is nearing his 600^th day in office, which is ample time for him to develop, refine, and pursue his economic policies to “Make America Great Again.” This milestone is a good time to appraise his “MAGAnomics.”

Right now, his policies appear to be successful. The unemployment rate hovers around record-low levels, gross domestic product topped 4 percent in the last quarter and consumer confidence is as high as it’s been since the late-1990s technology boom. But economic policy isn’t just about the present, but about the long-term. So how is MAGAnomics doing in that regard?

Fiscal policy

President Trump’s biggest policy triumph so far is the fall 2017 tax legislation that cut income tax rates on businesses and individuals, increased the standard deduction and family tax credit, capped a number of deductions used by wealthy taxpayers, and ended the Affordable Care Act’s insurance penalty.

The lower business tax rate and the capped tax deductions are noteworthy achievements. The former reduces the deadweight loss on desirable business activity and brings the U.S. rate in line with the rest of the developed world. The latter reduces the regressivity of some parts of the tax code. Those changes will likely endure because future Congresses won’t want to reinstitute a tax disadvantage on U.S. businesses or restore a tax break for the rich.

However, the overall reduction in Americans’ taxes will almost certainly not endure because federal spending wasn’t cut; in fact, it’s increased. Trump and Congress will close the budget gap with more federal borrowing, returning America to trillion-dollar deficits.

Unless Congress undertakes some serious budget-cutting, federal taxes will have to rise to pay those debts, or at least to satisfy America’s lenders that they will be repaid. Because of that, the 2017 tax changes are “fake” tax cuts.

Trade and immigration

The Trump administration has made clear that its top two policy priorities are managing the nation’s international trade and reducing both legal and illegal immigration.

On trade, Trump has backed out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a pact to lower trade barriers between nations around the Pacific Rim. He’s also threatening to abandon similar pacts with Europe and the rest of North America. Trump is now taxing imported steel and aluminum, washing machines, and solar panels, and has threatened tariffs on automobiles. He’s also singled out specific nations like China for general tariffs. In response, China, Canada, and the European Union are raising tariffs on U.S. goods.

Protectionism mainly harms the protectionist countries by raising taxes on their consumers. President Trump says his tariffs will force other countries to open their markets, claiming that “every country is calling every day” to make new agreements. But he’s yet to announce any new deals, and no serious negotiations are occurring. Instead, we seem to have a reverse–Galt’s Gulch where America withdraws from international exchange while other countries lower their trade barriers and grow richer.

President Trump claims that legal and illegal immigration threaten national security and public safety. Many of his supporters also say that cutting immigration will raise Americans’ wages. Problem is, crime data show the opposite; immigrants (both legal and illegal) are less likely to commit violent and property crimes than native citizens, and the nation’s immigration vetting procedures—tightened heavily after 9/11—have proven highly effective at screening out dangerous persons. There is some evidence that immigration lowers wages for low-skilled workers—particularly previous immigrants—but it also appears to increase native-born workers’ wages overall. Immigrants are also more likely to start businesses and more likely to work than native citizens.

On immigration and trade, MAGAnomics is a complete failure.

Regulation

Regulatory policy appears to be a MAGAnomics success. Following Trump’s taking office, the Republican-led Congress repealed more than a dozen regulations the Barack Obama administration implemented in its last months in office. Trump appointees also put the brakes on current rulemaking in the federal agencies, smothering a slew of Obama initiatives in the pipeline. This has yielded a historic freeze in the growth of federal regulation and a slight decline in the cost of regulation.

But America needs more than a halt to new regulations; it needs a rollback and simplification of whole regulatory regimes that are now in place. This happened in the great deregulatory wave of the 1970s–1990s, yielding large public benefits. Unfortunately, the Trump administration isn’t laying the policy groundwork and building the political coalitions necessary for another wave. As a result, MAGAnomics will likely have no long-term regulatory effects and its short-term achievements will be reversed the next time the Democrats have control of the White House and Congress. Trump’s regulatory policy is light-weight and disappointing.

Long-term challenges

The federal debt is over $21 trillion, more than the nation’s GDP for an entire year. That’s only part of America’s financial woes; in order for Social Security and Medicare to continue paying their current level of benefits for the next 75 years (basically, the lifespan of today’s children), they’ll need to increase their taxes in order to collect, respectively, an additional $13.2 trillion and $37.2 trillion.

Yet Trump has repeatedly vowed to make no changes to Social Security or Medicare and plans to run up more government debt. This saddles the U.S. economy with uncertainty and threatens American workers’ retirement. This is another MAGAnomics failure.

Conclusion

Trump’s economic agenda is little more than an impulsive dislike of trade and immigration, a hazy desire for less regulation, and a willingness to lower taxes in the short run, but not do the hard work to keep taxes low and strengthen Americans’ financial security in the long run. In other words, MAGAnomics is a slogan, not a serious plan to strengthen the nation’s economy. Because of that, Trump’s first 600 days of economic policy have been a dud.

Thomas A. Firey is a Maryland Public Policy Institute senior fellow and a Washington County native.