Cutting payroll taxes will not deliver well-timed help to the economy. Employees would get a little more with every paycheck. The deficit would rise in part because of benefits coming in December, long after the need may have passed. The administration is responding to the political need to “do something” about the economy, but Trump’s first instinct was the right one: Macroeconomic stabilization is a job for the Fed.

Ramesh Ponnuru is a senior editor for National Review , a columnist for Bloomberg Opinion, a visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, and a senior fellow at the National Review Institute. @rameshponnuru