Publication date: September 2, 2021
Written by: Stefani Buhajla, Hayden Dublois
In President Biden’s address to a Joint Session of Congress in April, he declared his first 100 days to be a raging success saying, “America is on the move again.” Poll numbers, however, tell a different story: America is struggling under the weight of the administration’s bad policies, and voters are concerned—not confident—about the future.
Federal Spending
Since taking office, the Biden administration has spent taxpayer dollars with abandon, bringing the national debt to historic levels. The president’s budget plan and infrastructure packages reached well into the trillions of dollars. More than half of all voters are concerned about recent increases in federal spending (65%).
Of those concerned with federal spending, 46% name unemployment bonuses or state bailouts as their top issues. These concerns are likely the product of extended economic shutdowns that brought the economy to a screeching halt, followed by the federal government’s attempts to spend its way out of a self-imposed recession with stimulus packages and bailouts.
Inflation
But the print-and-spend campaign aimed at repairing the economic damage has a serious side effect—inflation.
Most voters say they are concerned about recent increases in the cost of goods and services, such as gas, food, and housing (75%)—and their concerns are valid. Annualized consumer inflation for 2021 is now 7.1%, compared to just 1.3% in 2020, with annualized producers’ prices up 27.7% so far.
A significant majority of voters report the belt is tightening on their or their family’s budget due to the rise in prices of goods (70%). Of price increases in gasoline, housing, groceries, or other, the rise in groceries concerns voters the most (39%). Rightfully so—over the course of just one month, family dinner staples like pork roasts and ribs jumped 4.4%. And not only are groceries themselves more expensive, the cost of making a grocery run has nearly doubled. The prices of gas and used cars both jumped 45% from June 2020.
39%
most concerned about
price increases of
Groceries
28%
most concerned about
price increases of
Gasoline
17%
most concerned about
price increases of
Housing
16%
most concerned about
price increases of
other
Worker Shortages
Roughly three-quarters of Republican (76%) and Independent voters (73%) say their families or communities have been negatively impacted by worker shortages at local businesses and restaurants.
Yet almost half of all Democrats say they have not been impacted by worker shortages at all (48%). Such a stark difference in experience raises the question of whether Democrat voters are truly that isolated and out of touch from the impacts of their party’s policies.
Widespread worker shortages encouraged by continuous unemployment bonuses are driving supply of goods and services down and making it difficult for businesses to meet market demands. The result is a thumb the scale of inflation.
Almost three-quarters of Republicans (73%), and a plurality of Independents by a 22-point margin, blame these unemployment bonuses for the worker shortage. And the concern does not stop there. Certain individuals could make up to $44,000 per year by staying at home after state-paid unemployment, the federal bonus, and other welfare benefits. It is beginning to look like unemployment bonuses are a new form of welfare, and most voters are somewhat or very concerned with efforts to expand welfare programs in the United States (68%).
Currently, there are a record 10.1 million open jobs available due to federal unemployment bonuses and expanded welfare benefits making it possible for Americans to make more money by not working.
Democrat governors were more forceful with economic lockdowns in 2020 and continue to push for unemployment incentives in the form of unemployment bonuses and relaxed eligibility for welfare programs—and are even enticing states to expand Medicaid through new federal reimbursements. Except for Louisiana, no Democrat-led states chose work over welfare by ending the disastrous unemployment bonuses.
States that opted out of the federal unemployment bonus, such as Arkansas and Montana, are leading the economic recovery. Unemployment spending plummeted, employers reported thousands of new hires, and revenue collections exploded. With the bonus set to expire nationwide in just a few days, states that did not opt out of the federal unemployment bonus program should start to see similar effects.
COVID-19
After nearly a year and a half of conflicting messages from the CDC nearly half of all voters say they are very concerned about new strains of coronavirus (47%).
Yet, by an eight-point margin, voters indicate that economic shutdowns are a cure worse than the disease. In fact, most voters overwhelmingly agree that:
67%
Public school shutdowns are making it difficult for working parents to re-enter the workforce.
56%
Working moms are now at a greater disadvantage in the workplace due to gaps in their resumes and experience from having to stay at home with their children during the pandemic.
66%
The extended public school shutdowns have negatively impacted the mental health of America’s youth.
66%
Extended public school shutdowns have resulted in an education gap for America’s youth.
A vast majority of Democrat voters agree that economic shutdowns are harmful: More than half say that public school shutdowns are making it difficult for parents to re-enter the workforce (54%) and have resulted in education gap for America’s youth (51%), and exactly half agree that public school shutdowns have negatively impacted the mental health of young Americans (50%). Yet more than half of them still say they are supportive economic shutdowns (53%). It is in these numbers that the cognitive dissonance of the Left becomes most apparent.
As an aside, in other recent state-level polling, Iowa voters chose taking health precautions over any further economic shutdowns by a 48-point margin when asked how the state should deal with new strains of coronavirus.
Immigration
The United States’ porous southern border is not only contributing to the spread of COVID-19, but it is also fostering humanitarian and national security crises all its own.
Border Patrol saw a record number of migrants—more than 200,000—attempt to cross the border in July alone. An alarming 18% of migrants leaving Border Patrol custody in the United States have tested positive for COVID-19. For most voters, this is cause for concern: 78% of all Republicans and 56% of all Independents say they are very concerned about the immigration situation at the United States’ southern border, and more than half of all voters combined think the situation at the southern border is a national security crisis (54%).
The inaction of the Biden administration on the immigration crisis does not reflect popular opinion. Overwhelmingly, a majority of all voters say the United States should tighten border security in response to the increase of illegal immigration at the southern border (65%)—and this includes 41% of all Democrat voters.
Cancel Culture
Many Americans are worried about what has become known as “cancel culture”—when a person is “cancelled” or ostracized from public life or their profession for their personal political or religious beliefs. Our survey shows that more than half all voters think this could become a bigger problem affecting everyday people in the workplace (55%).
As the “cancel culture” phenomenon often begins or manifests online, it is unsurprising that nearly half of all voters are very concerned about individuals being censored online and on social media platforms for their political opinions or religious beliefs (48%).
Elections Integrity & Law Enforcement
American voters diverge from the president and his party on issues of election integrity and funding for law enforcement.
American voters want secure elections—they want to be confident in knowing their ballot will be counted and will not be canceled out by fraudulent ones. More than 60% of all Americans say they are concerned about institutional fraud in our elections (61%).
And with the rise in crime across American cities and suburbs, the once-woke cry to “defund the police” is wildly unpopular. Voters see that the thin blue line as necessary to keeping their communities safe. Most voters—including 56% of Democrats—oppose efforts to defund police departments (64%).
What This Means for 2022
It is abundantly clear that Americans do not approve of the direction our country is headed. Voters are showing signs of being unsettled on many fronts, and that spells doom for Democrats hoping to retain control of the House in 2022.
The Biden administration says that America is “rising anew” and “ready for takeoff” but the average American voter—regardless of political affiliation—is clearly having a different experience.
Voters are looking for runways, not roadblocks, to economic recovery and blame out-of-control spending, inflation, and unemployment bonuses that discourage work for blocking the way forward. The Biden administration claims to be serious about protecting Americans from COVID-19 yet has made no serious effort to secure the border or address the mounting crisis there.
In case Democrats needed any more evidence that their position is tenuous, polling shows President Biden’s approval numbers continue to follow a downward trend. In May, 51% of Americans approved of the job he is doing as president. Since then, that number has dropped 11 points to a staggering 40%.
The elected officials who truly want to earn the votes of their constituents in 2022 will listen to the concerns of American voters and respond accordingly by getting government out of the way of economic recovery and addressing the failed foreign policy issues of the Biden administration head on.
Americans see the real issues threatening their future and they live with the consequences of politicians’ decisions every day.
The GOP only needs to stand in the gap for voters and the House will be theirs to lose.