(CNN) President Donald Trump is trying to outrun a possible recession as he runs for reelection in 2020, but his efforts to keep the economy going now might make any downturn harder to fix.

Trump says he's looking at a range of proposals to keep the economy moving -- everything from giving workers a pay bump by cutting payroll taxes to cutting capital gains taxes for investors.

But economists say attempts by the President to get ahead of a slowdown today would leave policymakers with far less ammunition to fend off further calamities down the road.

"We're shooting all the arrows before we even need to start shooting," said Steven Rosenthal, a senior fellow at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. "If things turn out badly, our conventional tools will have been exhausted to a great degree."

During past downturns, both Democrats and Republicans -- including former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama -- have leaned on tools like one-time tax rebates or extended unemployment benefits to spur consumer spending, a major driver of economic growth.

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