What Trump's 'Big Beautiful Bill' Means for Your Taxes

It's official...

On July 4, President Donald Trump signed the "One Big Beautiful Bill Act" into law.

The 900-plus-page budget bill included headline-grabbing changes like increasing the budget for border control, reducing Medicaid spending, and limiting the maximum student-loan amount.

We aren't going to debate the policies in the bill, including how it adds trillions of dollars to the national debt. You can find everything from economic analyses to rage-based clickbait all over the Internet.

Instead, we want to cover the changes that are most likely to directly impact your pocketbook. Whether you love or hate the bill, it will probably save you money – especially if you take advantage of all its provisions.

We don't have space to cover everything in the bill... but we want to cut through the noise on a few things that should matter to our readers.

Most folks will see the most benefit from permanent extensions from the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act ("TCJA"), which Trump signed into law in December 2017. Let's look at some of the important parts of the bill when it comes to your taxes...

Lower tax rates and adjusted tax brackets introduced through the TCJA will become permanent. This won't change your tax rate from last year's levels, but it will keep it from automatically jumping back to its higher 2017 amount.

The standard deduction will increase to $15,750 for single filers and $31,500 for joint filers in 2026. It will also continue to increase every year, indexed to inflation. This year, the standard deduction was $15,000 and $30,000, respectively. And without the bill, it would have fallen to an estimated $8,350 and $16,700, respectively.

Seniors will get an extra deduction of $6,000 for individuals and $12,000 for couples. This deduction starts to phase out for individuals earning more than $75,000 ($150,000 for couples). The bill applies this deduction through 2028, at which point it would expire if Congress doesn't pass an extension.

The standard deduction is the amount you can automatically lop off your taxable income. Usually, you'd do this in place of individual itemized deductions. But as we'll explain, a few of the bill's new provisions apply whether you itemize deductions or take the standard deduction.

Three of those are charitable donations, tips and overtime pay, and auto-loan interest.

First, single filers can now deduct $1,000 in charitable donations, while couples can deduct $2,000, on top of the standard deduction. Previously, the standard deduction precluded further deductions for charity.

Next, through 2028, you can deduct up to $12,500 per year (or $25,000 for couples) in overtime bonus pay. In other words, if you normally make $50 an hour and get paid $75 for qualified overtime hours, you'd deduct $25 from each hour of overtime you received.

You can also deduct money earned from tips, based on to-be-determined rulings about which jobs are eligible.

Finally, if you're buying a new car that's assembled in the U.S., you could deduct up to $10,000 in loan interest. This applies if you make $100,000 or less ($200,000 or less for couples) on top of the standard deduction. The amount drops by $200 for every $1,000 in income after that, phasing out at $149,000 for single filers and $249,000 for couples.

(We hope that none of our readers is paying $10,000 per year in interest for a car... so your amount should be comfortably under the maximum.)

Now let's see how some of these changes could affect your tax bill...

Let's say you're 55 years old, earned $100,000 (including $5,000 in overtime pay), take the standard deduction, paid $2,000 in auto-loan interest, and gave $1,000 in charitable donations.

Under the new tax bill, you'd pay about $11,689 in federal tax. That's down from the $13,581 you paid this year... and $15,959 you'd have paid if the TCJA had expired.

Another big change applies only to folks who don't take the standard deduction. If you itemize your deductions, you can now deduct up to $40,000 in state and local tax ("SALT") payments. This applies to things like your property-tax bill. Previously, you could deduct just $10,000 of SALT payments on your federal income taxes.

The bill also gives people a couple of new ways to save...

First, more Americans will qualify for health savings accounts ("HSAs"). An HSA lets you bank pretax dollars, which you can then use to pay for health expenses. Even better, once you hit 65, you can withdraw the money without penalty for any expense... You'll just have to pay taxes if it's used for something nonmedical. And best of all, there are no use-it-or-lose-it rules for HSAs.

Previously, you needed a high-deductible health plan, or HDHP, to open an HSA. Next year, if you have a "bronze" or "catastrophic" plan (through the Affordable Care Act marketplace), you'll be eligible to open an HSA. I recommend taking advantage if your health insurance qualifies.

Second, if you have children in your family, a new "Trump account" allows annual contributions of $5,000 per year. For children born between January 1, 2025 and December 31, 2028. Their Trump accounts will automatically get $1,000 in "seed money" from the government.

Of course, even if the new tax rules save you some cash, they won't be enough to guarantee you a comfortable retirement... If you want to do that, you need to be proactive with your money.

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Now, let's get right into this week's Q&A... And as always, keep sending your comments, questions, and topic suggestions to feedback@healthandwealthbulletin.com. My team and I read every e-mail.

A Review From Our Auto Expert

Q: Hello – enjoy your new car and auto articles very much.

As a long time Subaru owner, I never see them mentioned with any frequency as Hyundai and Kia models, despite their stellar Consumer Reports ratings. We find Subarus to be outstanding vehicles and not ridiculously priced.

Would appreciate any thoughts on the new 2025 Forester Hybrid model. – T.D.S.

A: Thank you for reading, T.D.S. By the way, I own a Subaru Outback myself.

The auto expert on our team, Brady Holt, wrote about the nonhybrid version of the Forester in my Retirement Millionaire newsletter last year. (Paid subscribers can read it here.) Here's what he has to say now...

Unfortunately, the 2025 Forester got a big price bump as part of a new redesign. But you're right, it's still not obscenely expensive. I also love that it has big windows, making it easy to see out of.

The new gas-electric hybrid version is intriguing, too. I'm scheduled to test one later this month, and I'm looking forward to it. It pairs a hybrid system from Toyota with the mechanical all-wheel-drive system from Subaru. This gives it more all-terrain capability than a Toyota RAV4 Hybrid, whose rear wheels are powered only by an electric motor – not connected to the engine like the Forester Hybrid's. But the Subaru isn't as economical in government testing, getting 35 mpg instead of the Toyota's 39 mpg.

I'm a fan of hybrids in general. Because they charge their electric batteries while you drive, they're a low-effort way to cut your gas bill – at low speeds, anyway. At higher speeds, the electric motors are too small to help out much, while gas engines run at peak efficiency. In the Forester's case, the gas model gets an estimated 26 mpg in the city versus the hybrid's 35 mpg. But when you're just cruising on the highway, the hybrid's advantage is just 1 mpg more – 34 mpg versus 33 mpg.

If you mostly take long trips, it makes less sense to pay extra for a hybrid. But for rush-hour traffic, the hybrid can save you a lot of trips to the gas station.

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Here's to our health, wealth, and a great retirement,

Dr. David Eifrig and the Health & Wealth Bulletin Research Team
July 11, 2025