In 2025, the U.S. entered a new normal–an emergent period of “certain uncertainty” in all aspects of American life. This new normal is rooted primarily in the Trump Administration’s use of White House Executive Orders—a total of 225 in the first year of his second term in office—to purportedly “Make America Great Again.”
The Impact
As we have shown elsewhere, the White House Executive Orders, especially those downsizing the federal government, dismantling DEI programs, accelerating deportations, and clamping down on international migration, are disrupting the employment prospects of the American worker; creating economic instability and cognition challenges in the nation’s households and families; and transforming both the size and composition of the U.S. population in ways that threaten our nation’s innovation capacity and competitiveness in global markets.