A major­i­ty of like­ly 2022 Wash­ing­ton State vot­ers agree more with Democ­rats than Repub­li­cans about the caus­es of infla­tion and price increas­es, a sur­vey con­duct­ed last week for the North­west Pro­gres­sive Insti­tute has found.

50% of 782 like­ly vot­ers inter­viewed for NPI by Pub­lic Pol­i­cy from Octo­ber 19th-20th said they agreed more with Democ­rats about the caus­es of infla­tion and price increas­es, while 43% agreed with Repub­li­cans more. 7% were not sure.

Visu­al­iza­tion of NPI’s Octo­ber 2022 poll find­ing con­cern­ing Wash­ing­to­ni­ans’ views on the caus­es of inflation

Repub­li­cans have tried to claim through­out 2022 that Pres­i­dent Biden’s poli­cies, includ­ing the admin­is­tra­tion’s response to COVID-19 are to blame for increas­es in the cost of liv­ing that Amer­i­cans are grap­pling with.

Yet our research shows that most Wash­ing­ton vot­ers are more in agree­ment with Democ­rats that what’s dri­ving infla­tion and price increas­es are Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine, the eco­nom­ic after­shocks of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, and cor­po­rate prof­i­teer­ing that Repub­li­cans won’t help rein in.

Here’s the full text of the ques­tion we asked and the answers we received:

QUESTION: Democ­rats say that recent infla­tion and price increas­es are being dri­ven by Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine, the eco­nom­ic after­shocks of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, and cor­po­rate prof­i­teer­ing that Repub­li­cans won’t help rein in. Repub­li­cans say that infla­tion and price increas­es are being dri­ven by Democ­rats’ reck­less spend­ing, vac­cine man­dates, and sup­ply chain woes Biden hasn’t fixed. Who do you agree with more con­cern­ing the caus­es of inflation?

ANSWERS:

• Agree with Democ­rats more: 50%
• Agree with Repub­li­cans more: 43%
• Not sure: 7%

Our sur­vey of 782 like­ly 2022 Wash­ing­ton State midterm vot­ers was in the field from Wednes­day, Octo­ber 19th through Thurs­day, Octo­ber 20th. The sur­vey was con­duct­ed by Pub­lic Pol­i­cy Polling for the North­west Pro­gres­sive Insti­tute and has a mar­gin of error of +/- 3.5% at the 95% con­fi­dence interval.

It uti­lizes a blend­ed method­ol­o­gy, with auto­mat­ed phone calls to land­lines (50%) and text mes­sage answers from cell phone only respon­dents (50%).

More infor­ma­tion about the survey’s method­ol­o­gy is avail­able here.

Repub­li­cans may excel at mes­sag­ing and relent­less pro­pa­gan­da dis­sem­i­na­tion, but as we can see, there are lim­its to their noise machine’s effectiveness.

Democ­rats have an oppor­tu­ni­ty to go on offense regard­ing the cost of liv­ing by refram­ing and pro­vid­ing vot­ers the con­text that Repub­li­cans are try­ing to conceal.

The truth is, we live in a world with a glob­al­ly inte­grat­ed econ­o­my and infla­tion is a glob­al prob­lem. It’s not just the Unit­ed States that is expe­ri­enc­ing it. Every region and every con­ti­nent has been affect­ed. Infla­tion is actu­al­ly worse in Europe and many oth­er places in the world than it is here in the Unit­ed States. World events, espe­cial­ly the war in Ukraine and the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, are dri­ving infla­tion. But there’s also anoth­er cause that for­mer Labor Sec­re­tary Robert Reich has been thank­ful­ly try­ing to draw atten­tion to: cor­po­rate profiteering.

Here’s Reich, writ­ing in The Guardian:

Infla­tion in the Unit­ed States is also being caused by cor­po­ra­tions rais­ing their prices faster than their costs to fat­ten their prof­it margins.

The evi­dence of this is now all around us.

Cor­po­rate prof­it mar­gins are at record highs.

“The com­pa­nies who set prices are real­ly reluc­tant to stop increas­ing them,” says Jean­na Smi­alek, who writes about the Fed for the New York Times. “What we saw was that cor­po­ra­tions were actu­al­ly pock­et­ing quite a bit more prof­it off this… They’re still putting up prices very rapid­ly, even in instances where their own costs are start­ing to fall.”

Cor­po­rate prof­its con­tin­ue to climb even as con­sumers are tak­ing it on the chin. It’s a giant redis­tri­b­u­tion from con­sumers to corporations.

“Until Democ­rats tell it like it is, their elec­toral majori­ties will con­tin­ue to be frag­ile,” Reich says. And he makes a very, very good point. Democ­rats should be cam­paign­ing on a wind­fall prof­its tax and cor­po­rate accountability.

It has been said that every good sto­ry has a hero and a vil­lain. Repub­li­cans want to make Pres­i­dent Biden, Speak­er Pelosi, and Democ­rats the vil­lains in this year’s infla­tion sto­ry. But the real vil­lains are dic­ta­tors like Vladimir Putin and cor­po­rate CEOs who are hap­pi­ly exploit­ing peo­ple’s eco­nom­ic hard­ship. If Democ­rats don’t name and blame those vil­lains, Repub­li­cans’ nar­ra­tive is more like­ly to stick.

The results of the ques­tion we asked last week about the caus­es of infla­tion show that despite Repub­li­cans’ best efforts so far, an open­ing remains for Democ­rats to engage in a dia­logue with vot­ers about what’s real­ly happening.

Sure, the vot­ing has start­ed, ads are already up on the air, and many strate­gic deci­sions have already been made. But mil­lions upon mil­lions of Amer­i­cans haven’t vot­ed yet, espe­cial­ly those who are unde­cid­ed. A win­dow of oppor­tu­ni­ty remains for Democ­rats to talk to those vot­ers and rebut Repub­li­cans’ narrative.

Repub­li­cans haven’t actu­al­ly pro­posed any ideas or poli­cies to help mid­dle and low income Amer­i­cans who are grap­pling with infla­tion. They’re just play­ing a big blame game and urg­ing vot­ers to take out their frus­tra­tion on Democrats.

Democ­rats, mean­while, have actu­al­ly come up with and passed ideas to com­bat infla­tion. The Infla­tion Reduc­tion Act, for exam­ple, is so named because it seeks to address Amer­i­cans’ cost of liv­ing con­cerns and tan­gi­bly help them.

Empow­er­ing Medicare to start nego­ti­at­ing pre­scrip­tion drug prices is a big, big deal. Despite hav­ing real accom­plish­ments to tout and good ideas to go even fur­ther, Democ­rats have strug­gled to make their case to voters.

On so-called social issues or in defense of democ­ra­cy, the par­ty is increas­ing­ly good at speak­ing with one voice. Democ­rats have seized the offen­sive in response to the Supreme Court’s hor­rif­ic Dobbs deci­sion, for exam­ple, and Democ­rats also speak with clar­i­ty and con­vic­tion on LGBTQ+ rights and gun safety.

But on eco­nom­ic jus­tice, not so much.

The par­ty does for­tu­nate­ly have role mod­els it can turn to and trust in right now.

Reich, Sen­a­tor Eliz­a­beth War­ren, and Sen­a­tor Bernie Sanders are among those who speak with great con­vic­tion and pas­sion on mat­ters of eco­nom­ic jus­tice. They’re good sto­ry­tellers and they don’t pass up an oppor­tu­ni­ty to reframe.

If more Democ­rats fol­lowed the exam­ple of these bold and inspir­ing lead­ers, the par­ty’s prospects of suc­cess in these midterms would brighten.

Democ­rats are very for­tu­nate in that they have a more fired up and moti­vat­ed base than they had in 2010 or 2014. Polls sug­gest many races are close and could go either way. To win, Democ­rats must be ready to go out and make the strongest pos­si­ble clos­ing argu­ment. Aggres­sive­ly address­ing tough issues like cost of liv­ing head on and call­ing out the real vil­lains is nec­es­sary and important.