Inflation and prices still reign as the top issue of importance for Americans, according to the latest weekly survey from the Economist/YouGov.
The survey asked respondents, “Which of these is the most important issue for you?” It listed over a dozen issues and found one still standing supreme: Inflation/prices.
Overall, 23 percent chose that as the most important issue, followed by 14 who — similarly — said the most important issue is jobs and the economy.
In third place came health care, followed by eight percent who said immigration, eight percent who said civil rights, seven percent who said civil liberties, six percent who said national security, six percent who said taxes and government spending, and six percent who said climate change and the environment. The remaining issues — including education, abortion, crime, guns, criminal justice reform, and foreign policy — saw three percent support or less.
There seems to be a consensus across party lines, as a plurality of Republicans (29 percent) independents (19 percent), and Democrats (22 percent) agree that the most important issue is inflation/prices.
In second place for Democrats is civil rights with 15 percent, followed by 12 percent who say jobs and the economy. For Republicans, jobs and the economy emerge as the second most important issue (17 percent), followed by immigration (16 percent). Independents say jobs and the economy are the second most important issue (13 percent), followed by health care (11 percent).
The survey was taken August 9-11, 2025, among 1,635 respondents. It has a +/- 3.5 percent margin of error.
It comes as President Donald Trump has continued to push policies to lower prices. As Breitbart News’s Economics Editor John Carney reported, “American consumer confidence improved more than expected in early July, climbing to its highest level in five months as inflation expectations fell sharply and retail spending showed renewed strength.”
One-year inflation expectations fell to 4.4 percent, down from 5.0 percent in June and a recent peak of 6.6 percent in May. Five-year expectations dropped to 3.6 percent, the lowest since February. The back-to-back declines suggest that consumer fears about inflation—initially driven by concerns over new tariffs—are subsiding.
Speaking with Breitbart News during a recent policy event, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent explained how official inflation numbers understate the economic pain felt by working-class Americans and showcased how Trump’s comeback focuses on wages and inflation.
“The reason he won is because the bottom 50 percent of working Americans got crushed,” Bessent said. “If you go by the standard inflation numbers—PCE, CPI—during the Biden years, inflation was about 18 to 21 percent. Reported wages were about 3 percent below that.”
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“But that isn’t the real story,” Bessent continued, “because working-class Americans have a different basket of goods and services than everyone in this room.”
“They’re dependent on used cars, insurance, rent. They don’t have assets. So they probably experienced inflation between 32 and 35 percent, with wage growth at only 16 percent. They had a gigantic, gigantic loss of purchasing power,” he added, noting the affordability crisis can be solved by both lowering inflation as well as raising real wages.
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