The proposal for a “DOGE dividend,” which would distribute 20% of government savings to taxpayers, has gained support from President Trump and Elon Musk — and now it could potentially be enshrined in law, The Post has learned.
The 28-year-old hedge fund manager behind the idea, James Fishback, told The Post he met with Elon Musk last week and began meeting with lawmakers about his idea earlier this week.
“The president supports this and Elon likes the idea of incentivizing people to report waste, fraud, and abuse,” Fishback told me. “The bill will be coming in the next few days.”
He added, “This approach will save taxpayers even more money — it would compound the returns that doge is finding.”
Under Fishback’s proposal, households that are net taxpayers — those who pay into the government more than they receive in benefits — would receive 20% of all DOGE’s saving.
Another 20% will go to paying down the national debt and the other 60% would likely be allocated to the budget each year (Fishback doesn’t explicitly state that).
According to his math that would mean roughly 79 million households would get a $5,000 check each if Musk is able to cut $2 trillion from the federal budget he’s estimated he can trim.
Fishback has previously suggested the first check would come when DOGE terminates in July 2026, but if it become law before then, he said, Americans could get a check even sooner.
The idea gained traction after Fishback initially posted about the idea on X.
Elon Musk then “quote tweeted” the idea and shared his support for the idea on X while Trump praised the idea in a speech last week.
While some economists have suggested a possible dividend could push inflation higher, like stimulus checks did during the pandemic, Fishback believes his targeted approach disbursing checks will eliminate that issue.
“Sending checks isn’t inflationary … lockdowns and labor shortages compounded the effect of inflation [during Covid],” he said. “But the macro backdrop today is disinflationary.”
“It is similar to tax refund season — when the average check from the IRS is $3,100 and it goes to people’s rainy day fund, saving, and paying down debt.”
And, since the DOGE checks would only be sent to households paying taxes, these checks incentivize people to get back to work — unlike the Covid stimulus checks.
One positive outcome of the stimulus checks was that they pushed the stock market to new highs. DOGE dividend checks could also help stocks surge.
While Fisbhack told The Post he has no aspirations outside of his newly launched anti-woke fund Azoria, this latest effort comes as he tries to burnish his MAGA credentials.
He initially made headlines on Wall Street after exiting Greenlight Capital in August 2023 following a stint at billionaire David Einhorn’s hedge fund that resulted in an ongoing legal spat over Fishback’s title at the firm and non-compete clause, among other things.
Fishback told The Post that Einhorn’s political beliefs — he’s called Trump’s economic policy “incoherent” and made a point of publicly attacking Elon Musk’s Tesla — blinded him to opportunities in the market.
