The tax bill passed, now what? The republicans are set to celebrate a longed for success. But how should we measure success? Is it what we check off a list today, or do we wait to measure what today’s activity leads too? The bulk of economists that we have been following warn that the tax cuts, mainly focused on large corporations and the well to do, will lead to massive deficits.

The Republicans argue that the tax cuts will pay for themselves by creating more jobs and higher wages, leading to higher tax collections. And they may be right. But what if they aren’t? What if the economists are right? Can we safely assume that no one knows for sure, if tax cuts will be successful at stimulating the economy, creating more jobs, and that the “trickle down” effect will create more wealth for everyone?

In a case like that, no one knowing for sure, maybe it’s a 50/50 coin toss, logicians would rationally argue to weigh the outcome if the economists are right and the Republicans are wrong and vice versa.

So knowing what we do know already, that the tax bill largely rewards the wealthiest folks, gives a pittance to the middle class, and actually takes away from those most in need (the Republicans are already talking about cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security), and absent the hoped for stimulus, will create unfathomable deficits. (The cuts mentioned will be the bow to the hardline deficit hawks, without which the bill would not have passed.) Have they also lost their reason?

So let’s give the Republicans some room. Say there is a 25% (and not 50%) chance that the tax cuts fail to create the offsetting stimulus, dramatically ballooning the deficit. We are saying that there is some risk that the Republican calculous is wrong, and we all need to look at the outcome of that.

The government will either have to borrow money, or print money, to pay for all the things that Trump and the Republicans want to do (that is build the wall, reinforce the military, rebuild the infrastructure, etc.) . Let alone the things we are already doing. And they have already demonstrated that they don’t want their wealthy constituents to pay a fair share for them.

Well Trump has a bad history of defaulting on debt, even using the bankruptcy code to bail him out. So if they miscalculate, the harm to our lenders will be enormous. Interest rates, short of an actual default,  will surely perk up, while bond buyers wait for better rates before committing more funds, like a tide coming in. At the very least, the interest on our ballooning deficit will overwhelm our economy. Its pretty close to doing that already.

This means that the government will have no choice but to accelerate inflating currency, that is, simply running the printing presses 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, no end. It’s easy to print money.

We know a bit from studying history what that was like. Not fun at all. Even if the risk is only 25%, is it worth taking? The frustrating thing is we are thrust into taking that risk by a minority party that does not have the interest of most of its’ citizens in mind.

And what if the Republicans are right? How much real benefit will that create? Well we already know that many of our citizens will be hurt by this tax bill.. Maybe the tax bill is going to be like “good medicine”, but maybe too, there is a 25% chance that it will kill us. Most people are not that sick to want to take that chance. Is this a game of Russian Roulette??