How would independence affect the cost of living?

The single biggest threat to the cost of living, the steady erosion of the dollar, is made in Washington, and independence is a step away from it. Texas keeps its low-tax structure, holds open the path to stop the inflation tax, and is built to keep prices stable, not to spike them.

The inflation tax is the hidden bill on every Texan

The largest force pushing up the cost of living is not on any tax form. The dollar has lost about 97 percent of its purchasing power since the Federal Reserve opened in 1913, about 88 percent since the last tie to gold was cut in 1971, and about 22 percent since 2020 alone (BLS Consumer Price Index). That is policy, not bad luck. When Washington spends past what it collects, it prints the difference. The money supply jumped about 40 percent between February 2020 and March 2022, and inflation peaked at 9.1 percent. Every Texan paid for that at the grocery store and the gas pump.

Put a number on what it took from Texans

The Federal Reserve's own St. Louis bank found that inflation erased $1.8 trillion of purchasing power from Americans' bank deposits in the single year ending March 2022. Texans held about $1.45 trillion in deposits in mid-2024, roughly 7.8 percent of the national base (FDIC Summary of Deposits, all 6,213 branches in the state). Apply that share and Texans lost somewhere between $130 and $145 billion of purchasing power on their bank balances alone, in one year, and that counts only deposits. That is a cost-of-living hit the size of the whole annual dividend of independence, taken back invisibly, with no vote.

Sound money is the way out, and Texas is already building it

Small, disciplined countries hold stable currencies. Switzerland runs inflation near 0.6 percent, Singapore near 0.5 percent, a fraction of the dollar's recent record. Texas is already building the infrastructure to join them. The Texas Bullion Depository, the only state-run bullion vault in the country, opened in 2018. HB 1056, signed in 2025, makes gold and silver functional money Texans can spend by card. An independent Texas with sound money simply stops paying the largest tax Texans never voted for, which is the most direct cost-of-living relief on the table.

The tax structure that helps stays in place

Texas funds itself with no personal income tax, and that does not change at independence. Keeping more of a paycheck is itself cost-of-living relief, and it is the model Texas already runs. Ending the roughly $72 billion a year that leaves Texas just in federal debt interest frees up room to lower the burden further, including the property taxes that weigh on Texas households.

Keep trade open and prices stay stable

The thing that could raise prices is trade friction, and Texas can hold that nearly constant by keeping free trade with the United States and the dollar in circulation through the transition. Goods keep flowing across the Texas-U.S. line on the same terms, so the everyday basket does not jump. The cost-of-living risk people fear comes from barriers, and barriers are the variable Texas controls.

The bottom line

The biggest driver of a rising cost of living is the inflation tax printed in Washington, and independence with sound money is the exit from it. Texas keeps its no-income-tax structure, frees room by ending the outflow, and keeps trade open so prices stay steady.