One big question, perhaps the biggest on voters’ minds, will be the issue of affordability. What are Democrats proposing? More of the same policies?

• more spending on welfare and “affordable” housing

• more green-energy subsidies

• more healthcare regulation and higher minimum wages nationwide.

Look to Cost of Living

As Democrats try to capitalize on voters’ frustration with inflation, “affordability” seems to be the catch-all phrase in their vocabulary. At the WSJ, the editorial board takes a persnickety look at the cost of living and what, if Democrats win, they propose to do.

Consumer Price Level

A basic measure of inflation is the overall price level. The Consumer Price Index increased an average of 5% per year during the Biden presidency. During Trump’s first term, it rose by 1.9%. This term, despite the wailing, it stands at 2.9% so far.

Democrats’ Spending Blitz

During the Biden years, with their spending splurge in late 2020, each party contributed to the initial burst of inflation. In March 2021, however, Democrats lit the match under the housing market “with their $1.9 trillion spending blitz, largely for transfer payments and for states and localities.

“Democrats urged the central bank not to raise interest rates,’ even as inflation heated up in 2021.

Relaxing Standards

The Biden administration relaxed mortgage underwriting standards. This allowed borrowers to qualify for bigger mortgages and turbocharged the surge in home prices.

“Housing prices rose 5.3% a year on average during the Biden years, compared to 2.7% during the first Trump term and 3.7% so far in the second.”

A shock from population migration in the Sun Belt during the pandemic was responsible for prices going up. As housing supply caught up, though, prices have stabilized in these markets. By contrast, reports the WSJ, home prices and rents are now growing fastest in the Northeast, West Coast and areas of the Midwest where local zoning regulations and burdensome permitting make it harder to build.

‘Rent control and “just cause” eviction laws in progressive cities also deter new housing.’

Why have housing prices grown faster in metro areas like Boston (4.4%), New York City (4.4%), Minneapolis (3.7%) and Los Angeles (3.4%) than Dallas (1.9%), Atlanta (1.4%), Houston (0.3%) and Tampa (-0.6%)?

Affordable Housing Projects

Reports the Journal: it costs on average about 2.8 times as much to build an apartment in California as in Texas, according to the RAND Corp.

Some “affordable” housing projects in the Golden State cost more than $1 million per unit to build. One reason is state and local prevailing wage mandates, which Democrats want to require for all projects that benefit from federal funds.

Democrats are looking to raise the $7.25 an hour federal minimum wage to $15 or higher. In most Democratic-run states, they already impose minimum wages of at least $15 an hour. “This would mainly slam states with lower wage mandates, many of which have contested Senate races this year like Texas, Iowa and New Hampshire (all $7.25) and Ohio ($11).”  Businesses try to pass on higher wage costs to consumers to the extent they can.

How about gasoline prices? Those prices shot up during the Iran war. But, reports the Journal, the inflation-adjusted average of $3.43 a gallon across the second Trump term is still lower than the $3.89 average in the Biden years. “The average was $3.27 in the first Trump term, as shown in the nearby chart.

The Result: Higher Prices

Have voters forgotten that the Biden Administration tried to restrict oil and gas production by canceling leases in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, banning new offshore drilling in much of the Gulf of Mexico and along the Atlantic coast, and pausing leases on federal lands?

Then there is the climate-policy utopia of California, where gasoline costs $6.37 a gallon and diesel $8.40.

The state’s cap-and-tax program, reports the WSJ, along with low carbon fuel standard and hefty fuel taxes have driven up fuel prices and spurred refineries to shut down.

“Democrats now talk less about climate than during the Biden years, but their goal of banishing fossil fuels persists.”

It’s easy to blame President Trump and data centers for the rise in rising rates. But, as the WSJ notes, rates generally have increased with inflation.

The exception is Democratic-led states along the coasts, which have forced fossil-fuel and nuclear plants to shut down prematurely and tried to replace them with more expensive renewables like offshore wind and batteries.