Five Wallet Issues on the Ballot: What Nov. 3 Midterms Mean for Prices

By Daniel Okafor

Americans have faced more days this year with gasoline above $4 a gallon than in any other year on record, and the Nov. 3 midterm elections will help decide what happens next. Five areas sit at the center of the vote: fuel prices, healthcare costs, housing, taxes and artificial intelligence.

President Donald Trump's Republican Party holds the executive branch. The House of Representatives is widely expected to flip to Democratic control. Senate forecasts are less confident, but Democrats appear somewhat favored to win that chamber too, despite a decade of flopped election predictions.

What happens to gasoline and diesel prices?

Democrats plan to challenge Trump's handling of the Iran war if they win majorities. Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, the New York Democrat positioned to become the next House speaker, has backed war powers resolutions and other legislative moves to end the conflict.

A Fox News poll in September found 61% of voters view gasoline prices as a major problem, up from 48% two years ago. Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, said ending the Iran and Russia-Ukraine wars is the key to lower prices.

"That's a tough barometer that Americans are not very forgiving on," De Haan told MarketWatch.

Republicans have taken a different route. Trump has waived sanctions on Russian diesel and opened highway use of red-dyed diesel, a tax-exempt fuel meant for farms. Some battleground-state Republicans have pressed him to pause diesel exports, though experts warn that could backfire. Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, say gasoline prices will fall once the Iran war ends.

Tobin Marcus of Wolfe Research sees no clear timeline. "We'll get through the midterms, and the Iranians will not capitulate as Trump has been indicating," he wrote in a recent note.

Will healthcare costs move?

Healthcare ranks as voters' No. 1 economic concern. A KFF poll in September found 60% of voters are worried about healthcare expenses, edging out the 59% worried about gasoline and transportation.

Kim Monk, an analyst at Capital Alpha Partners, expects Democrats who win both chambers to pass a significant healthcare bill in 2027 through reconciliation, a process needing only a simple Senate majority. The bill would undo Medicaid cuts from last year's GOP megalaw and restore expired enhanced Obamacare subsidies. Trump would likely veto it, but Monk sees it as a starting point for the 2028 Democratic platform and a bigger package in 2029.

If Democrats win only the House, Monk predicted the bill "kind of where it ends — in the House — so that's all really about 2028 positioning.""

Evercore ISI analysts said a debt-limit or funding deal could "soften" Medicaid cuts or revive some Obamacare subsidies. Republicans, if they keep both chambers, may not prioritize healthcare at all. "It tends to not be as high of a priority for Republicans," Monk said.

How does housing policy change?

Democrats controlling both chambers could push subsidized financing for first-time homebuyers and a workforce-housing tax credit, according to Jaret Seiberg of TD Cowen. Bipartisanship has precedent: over the summer, both parties passed a bill restricting institutional investors from buying large numbers of homes, backed by 75% of voters in a Wall Street Journal survey. Full implementation of the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act could still take years.

Trump signed an executive order on Oct. 22 directing the Federal Housing Finance Agency to launch a pilot that automatically cancels mortgage-insurance premiums once borrowers hit equity thresholds, and to expand a title-insurance waiver program. Ian Katz of Capital Alpha expects most housing policy to come from the administration via FHFA or HUD. Americans will also vote on more housing ballot measures this November than in 20 years.

What about taxes and tariffs?

Henrietta Treyz of Veda Partners expects Democrats to push restoring green-energy tax credits and to challenge Trump's Canada tariffs. "If Dems were able to start the conversation, I think a lot of Republicans would vote for it," she said. An AP-NORC poll found 64% of U.S. adults think Trump has gone too far on tariffs, up from 58% in January.

Trump warned his tax cuts are at stake: "If the Democrats for any reason won, all of the no tax on tips, no tax on Social Security for our great seniors, no tax on overtime — it all gets eliminated," he told reporters in September. Treyz expects no major GOP tax push after last year's One Big Beautiful Bill.

Who governs AI and data centers?

UBS analysts expect a Democratic Congress to pass bills protecting workers and holding AI companies accountable, which Trump would likely veto. A Penn Annenberg survey found 61% of Americans oppose new data centers where they live. Treyz flagged a possible Democratic drive to end AI data-center tax breaks in a debt-ceiling deal. Trump, defending AI's role in the economy and the race with China, has backed a federal moratorium on state AI laws — a measure UBS says is unlikely to clear 60 Senate votes.

A real AI disaster could force action regardless of party. With at least 63 new members arriving in January after record retirements, Treyz noted many newcomers "all have a 10-point plan for how they want to reform AI.""