Harris poll for Guardian finds people reconsidering major life events such as having children or buying a home
Americans are reconsidering major life events including marriage, having children and buying a home amid economic anxiety in the opening months of the Trump presidency, according to an exclusive poll for the Guardian.
Six in 10 Americans said the economy has affected at least one of their major life goals, according to the Harris poll, citing either lack of affordability or anxiety around the current economy.
Though Donald Trump’s tariff policies have only been in place for a few weeks, and though he has temporarily walked back on some of his harshest policies, the findings are a sign that Trump’s economic agenda could have long-term effects.
Literally every single election the talking point is how many people didn’t bother to vote. And it’s always the same percentage. The only time it changed much at all was after Trump killed a few million Americans with his COVID policies. The only way to make any change more is to have a national voting holiday plus compulsory voting.
I’d rather have universal vote by mail. We already have it in multiple states and it works fine. No need to mess with schedules if people can do it on their own time.
It isn’t mutually exclusive. Plus a holiday dedicated to voting means a day is open for researching a candidate, if needed. Also, psychologically, having the purpose of the holiday explicit means that some people will follow the rules of it. There are many prongs to getting people to vote.
The problem with the voting holiday idea, is many people are forced to work every holiday. They are generally the most marginalized people who work in the service industry as well. I used to be one. I was the general manager of a pizza shop and I worked every single holiday, football game, anything you can think of that will keep people from cooking and/or get them drinking. I also scheduled basically the entire staff for those days. It sucked. I told everyone from the start that holidays don’t exist for you anymore in food, but it didn’t stop women with tears in their eyes telling me they never expected they wouldn’t be able to take their kids trick or treating.
I think the way to resolve this is a holiday window for voting. The workers schedule 4 days of the week for work, then the remaining 3 days are paid holidays. The worker selects which days of that holiday week are best for them. If they don’t vote, their company is fined an amount double to the worker’s weekly pay.
I prefer vote by mail, too. However, real-life implementation of it only leads to a roughly 10% increase in voter turnout. That only brings us from 55% turnout to 65% turnout, which is pathetic.