Methodology
This visualization shows the estimated county-level impacts of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (Public Law 119-21), based on data from the Congressional Budget Office.
How the Data Was Created
- County Income Distributions: We estimated the income distribution for each U.S. county using American Community Survey data combined with macroeconomic projections for 2025.
- Lognormal Mixture Model: Each county's income distribution is modeled as a two-component lognormal mixture, fitted using Generalized Method of Moments (GMM).
- CBO Policy Effects: The Congressional Budget Office provides estimates of how the bill affects different income groups nationally. We map each county's population to these income deciles.
- Weighted Aggregation: County-level effects are computed by weighting CBO's marginal effects by the share of each county's population in each national income decile.
What the Metrics Mean
- Net Effect: The total per-person impact, combining all tax and transfer changes.
- Federal Tax Cut: Per-person reduction in federal taxes (positive = money saved).
- Federal Transfer Change: Change in federal benefits received (negative = benefits cut).
- State Tax: Estimated state-level fiscal response.
- Other Spending: Other spending and revenue changes.
Income Groups
- Low Income: Bottom 20% of national income distribution
- Middle Income: Middle 60% of national income distribution
- High Income: Top 20% of national income distribution
Data Sources
- Congressional Budget Office policy effect estimates
- American Community Survey (ACS) income data
- Bureau of Labor Statistics Local Area Unemployment Statistics (LAUS)
Technical Notes
All dollar amounts are annual per-person estimates totaled over the 10-year period from July 2025 to July 2034. Connecticut counties appear blank due to Census using planning areas instead of traditional counties.
Visualization by Visualize Policy. Economic modeling by William T. Dickens.