In other countries, budgets can be similarly divisive — but politicians there have started to ask two simple but powerful questions: Is what’s on the table going to make citizens’ lives better? And if not, how do we fix it?

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That’s the core idea behind a relatively new initiative by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which urged its member states once again in November to “look beyond the functioning of the economic system to consider the diverse experiences and living conditions of people and households.” In its report last year, the organization proposed that governments should focus their budgets more on quality of life, which includes health and work-life balance among other factors, as well as ensuring future well-being and material conditions such as income and wealth.

The debate about whether to drop our traditional measurements of economic success has gained more momentum in recent months, as some world leaders have publicly backed initiatives to move away from those metrics and have instead argued that more emphasis should be put on citizens’ well-being, with New Zealand emerging as the first nation willing to implement those ideas on a national scale.

So far, the United States has lagged behind other nations in citizens’ well-being. While it may have one of the world’s highest gross domestic products, it came in 18th in the world for national well-being in 2017, according to Social Progress Imperative, a U.S.-based nonprofit organization.

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So, how would Trump’s proposals fare, if we focused less on political ideology and more on the actual expected impact on citizens? New Zealand authorities have so far come up with the most sophisticated system to answer this question. Their OECD-inspired metrics differentiate between current and future well-being, with a number of subcategories that include environment and resources protection, health, housing, education, income, safety and social connections, in addition to other factors.

What makes their proposal especially interesting is that it’s supposed to survive upcoming elections and set a bipartisan standard for future policy initiatives from either side of the political spectrum.

So, how would Trump’s budget fare?

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Not too well, indicates a striking chart by my colleagues. The agencies for which cuts were proposed are largely those that would likely see their budgets maintained or expanded under an administration focused on New Zealand’s indicators of well-being.

Here are some examples:

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Current well-being

Environment

President Trump would like to slash the Environmental Protection Agency’s 2020 budget by 31 percent.

Health

The Department of Health and Human Services would face severe cuts under President Trump’s proposed budget, with Medicare being slashed by $845 billion over the next 10 years and Medicaid by $241 billion over the same timespan. The two programs give health insurance to older and low-income U.S. citizens.

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Supporters of Trump’s proposed budget would argue that improved health services for veterans and $291 million to stop the spread of HIV, as well as more funding to tackle the country’s opioid epidemic, are much-needed improvements.

But those measures are unlikely to calm concerns among critics who focus on other major proposed budget cuts to the National Institutes of Health (12 percent) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (10 percent).

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Housing

The Department of Housing and Urban Development is facing one of the most severe cuts, with a 16.4 percent decrease year over year. The cuts would likely affect initiatives to expand affordable housing and infrastructure, even though studies in the United States and abroad have shown that both factors are essential to social mobility.

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Knowledge and skills

The Education Department would see its funding slashed by 12 percent under Trump’s plans, with students from disadvantaged backgrounds fearing cuts to federal grant aid.

Income and jobs

Trump has argued that his economic policies have created millions of jobs for Americans, even though the extent to which that’s due to his policies remains controversial. Some of his budget proposals, including efforts to make employment training centers more efficient, may indeed end up helping Americans find jobs in the future. But cuts to education, housing and infrastructure could have the opposite impact.

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Safety

The president’s proposed budget would increase the Department of Homeland Security’s budget by 7.8 percent, with additional funding for a border wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. The proposed budget also expands funding for disaster response by $19.4 billion.

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But safety is a category far from being limited to immigration enforcement and natural disasters. Critics of the Trump administration would argue that gun control measures are absent from the proposal and that better social projects would similarly contribute to more safety in U.S. cities.

Future well-being

Natural capital

The proposed budget seeks a reduction of the Energy Department’s budget by 11 percent. The overall proposed cuts do not fully capture the real extent of the environmental damage they may result in, however. The agency’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy would be hit especially hard by the cuts, while the Office of Fossil Energy Research and Development and other programs would in fact see a boost in funding.

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Human and social capital

These two categories are difficult to measure, as they refer to bonds among citizens and the combined skill sets of people. But governments with an interest in expanding human and social capital may be well advised not to slash the Education and Labor Department budgets, as Trump has proposed.

Financial and physical capital

Whether Americans will have more or less money by the end of the Trump presidency depends on a variety of factors. Some may find jobs under the programs expanded by Trump. Others may face poverty as a result of slashed health-care programs or cut affordable housing initiatives.

What Trump proposed is in many ways a budget tailored to the demands of his supporters, rather than a response to the question: Is the way we spend money right now making citizens’ lives better, no matter whom they’re going to vote for?

Parts of this post were first published Feb. 14.