Days after Goldman Sachs’ top economists published research claiming price increases stemming from higher tariffs are poised to soon be borne mostly by consumers, President Donald Trump is urging the bank’s CEO, David Solomon, to get a new economist.
“Tariffs have not caused Inflation, or any other problems for America, other than massive amounts of CASH pouring into our Treasury’s coffers,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post on Tuesday. “David Solomon and Goldman Sachs refuse to give credit where credit is due.”
“I think that David should go out and get himself a new Economist or, maybe, he ought to just focus on being a DJ, and not bother running a major Financial Institution,” Trump added.
Solomon previously performed regularly at high-profile events. However, facing pressure from the bank’s board, he gave up his DJing side gig two years ago.
A report Goldman Sachs economists published over the weekend estimated Americans “absorbed 22% of tariff costs through June,” but that this share will rise to 67% by October if tariffs “follow the same pattern as the earliest ones.” Trump did not specifically reference that report in his post, however.
Goldman Sachs declined to comment on the president’s remarks.
The bank’s chief economist, Jan Hatzius, is one of the most followed economists both in Washington, where he’s met with former President Joe Biden and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, and on Wall Street.
Hatzius, an author of the report predicting the share of tariff costs consumers will cover, was an outlier in most circles of economists in 2023 for correctly predicting the US economy wouldn’t enter a recession.
On tariffs, Hatzius’ team’s forecasts share similarities with that of other leading financial institutions that are warning that consumers will experience tariff-related sticker shock. However, that hasn’t been the case so far despite a slew of higher tariffs Trump has enacted over the past few months.
New inflation data published Tuesday showed consumer prices rose 0.2% in July, keeping the annual inflation rate at 2.7%, according to the latest Consumer Price Index.
