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A new survey from Fox Business has found that twice as many Americans believe President Biden’s policies are making inflation worse and, as a result, their lives more difficult.
What’s more, voters by a 25-point margin also think that his “Build Back Better” social and climate spending bill will only make inflation worse, while most also believe it will harm the U.S. economy.
“One thing the president has going for him is low expectations,” Democratic pollster Chris Anderson, who along with Republican counterpart Daron Shaw, conducts Fox polls, said. “If the spending plans start to have positive impacts in people’s lives, maybe some will reconsider their view of Biden.”
A plurality of respondents — 4 in 10 — said that inflation is the biggest threat to the economy, which is more than double the number of people who said income inequality or the national debt. Also, less than 1 in 10 identified supply chain issues, government regulations, labor shortages, or the big tech monopolies as the biggest threats.
Roughly two-thirds of respondents said that Biden’s policies and leadership were at least somewhat responsible for rampant inflation, which is at its highest level since 1982, during Ronald Reagan’s first term. “Larger and roughly equivalent majorities blame the pandemic, government spending and regulations, and company price gouging,” Fox Business added.
Meanwhile, the survey, which was released on Wednesday, also found that rising prices over the spring and summer have caused two-thirds of voters to experience some financial hardship — a figure that rises to three-fourths among lower-income households.
“More than 8 in 10 are extremely or very concerned about inflation. That’s more than are worried about higher U.S. crime rates (77 percent), their taxes (71 percent), the federal deficit (69 percent), the pandemic (68 percent), being able to pay their bills (63 percent), and neighborhood crime (48 percent),” Fox Business reported.
By a more than 2-to-1 margin, respondents said that Biden’s economic policies have hurt them instead of helped them, thought that is largely driven by partisanship: Two-thirds of Republicans said, which is about five times the number of Democrats who said as much. By comparison, just one-third of Democrats said there were hurt by then-President Donald Trump’s economic policies in a December 2018 survey by Fox News.
Only 1-in-6 respondents said they are better off today than they were a year ago, while a majority rated their personal financial situations negatively. In August, by comparison, more than half of respondents said their personal finances looked okay.
“Views among independents are somewhat grim: 1 in 10 independents say they are better off financially than they were a year ago and 1 in 5 expects the economy will be better next year,” Fox Business reported.
Meanwhile, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said on Wednesday he believes that Biden’s massive “Build Back Better” bill filled with trillions in social and climate spending is “dead forever.”
Specifically, Graham pointed to Democratic colleague Sen. Joe Manchin, who has steadfastly opposed the cost of the $2 trillion-odd measure, largely over inflationary concerns.
“I think Build Back Better is dead forever, and let me tell you why: because Joe Manchin has said he’s not going to vote for a bill that will add to the deficit,” Graham told Fox News’s “Hannity” Wednesday evening.
“At the end of the day, Joe Manchin has promised the people of West Virginia, ‘I will not vote for a bill that adds to the deficit that’s full of gimmicks,’ so I think [it] is dead forever,” he said.
Graham’s comments came amid reports that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) was considering punting on the bill until next year, perhaps until March.
Jon has over 30 years' worth of reporting experience, as well as an author and U.S. Army veteran. He has a BA in political science from Ashford University and an MA in national security studies/intelligence analysis from American Military University.
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