Poll: Inflation tops voter concerns, national debt near the bottom

The Center Square’s Voters’ Voice Poll, conducted by Noble Predictive Insights Oct. 5-7, surveyed 2,527 registered voters nationally through an opt-in online panel and text-to-web cell phone messages. The pollster reports a margin of error of plus or minus 1.95 percentage points. Voters were asked to pick their top three issues from a list of 21.

Inflation led at 46%, up from 41% in an Aug. 12-16 survey of 2,533 voters and 37% in a March 2-5 survey that offered 19 options rather than 21. The economy and jobs followed at 31%, healthcare at 28% and government corruption at 25%.

Inflation was the top issue for every group in the survey. It ranked first among Democrats and Democratic-leaning voters at 47%, Republicans and Republican-leaning voters at 45% and true independents at 48%, the pollster’s term for voters who say they lean toward neither party. Nothing else came close to that agreement. Illegal immigration split 30% among Republicans and leaners to 6% among Democrats and leaners. National security split 23% to 7%.

Karlyn Bowman, a distinguished senior fellow emeritus at the American Enterprise Institute who has studied public opinion since the 1970s, said in an email that the pattern is a common one.

“Price levels/increases are immediate. We all feel them,” she said. “Issues such as the government debt are more abstract. People don’t think about them in their daily lives.”

The poll was in the field a week before the government confirmed prices were still climbing. Consumer prices rose 0.6% in September and 3.7% over the year, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Wednesday, up from 3.4% in August. Gasoline prices rose 9.1% in September alone and 34.2% over 12 months, accounting for more than half of the monthly increase. Grocery prices rose 1.8% over the year and restaurant prices 3.5%.

Voters ranked inflation higher while the headline number held still. The most recent inflation reading was 3.4% when the August poll was in the field, July’s rate, and 3.4% again when the October poll was conducted, August’s rate. Inflation gained five points as a top-three issue between the two.

Charles Franklin, director of the Marquette Law School Poll, whose September survey of Wisconsin voters found inflation and the cost of living the single most important issue for 45% of respondents, said the goods driving the increase are the ones people buy most often.

“Both are at least weekly purchases and people feel that directly, as opposed to rent or insurance costs which may rise once a year or so,” he said of gasoline and groceries. He pointed as well to cumulative increases since 2021: “There is still sticker shock at home or auto prices and in how much a family pays at the checkout for three or four bags of groceries, compared to what they remember paying 6 or so years ago.”

The fiscal issues ranked at the bottom. High taxes drew 16%, tariffs and international trade 14%, the national debt and government spending 13% and fraud 7%. The debt has not moved as a top three issue: it drew 14% of respondents in March, 14% in August and 13% in October, while inflation climbed nine points over the same period. It also drew about the same share from every group, 14% among Republicans and leaners, 13% among Democrats and leaners and 15% among true independents.

Franklin said that is unlikely to change on its own.

“Debt seldom gets attention, and then not for very long,” he said. “In the current political environment neither the president nor members of Congress are taking up the debt issue or providing leadership on the issue.” He cited the 2010 Simpson-Bowles commission as the last serious bipartisan attempt at budget reform, and said it failed to win much legislative support. When voters are focused on the cost of living, he said, “it is very hard [for] the debt, or the annual deficit, to get any traction, and certainly not without presidential and congressional leadership on the issue.”

Both parties have noticed. Franklin said Republicans and Democrats alike are running ads about grocery prices.

“Both parties say they will ‘fix’ the problem,” he said. “They are all quite vague as to how they will fix it.”

Voters go to the polls Nov. 3.