Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris are set to face off in a crucial debate on Tuesday, just under two months before Election Day.
The arguments will touch on a range of issues, but none may be more important than the economy, which is often cited as a top priority among voters.
ABC News spoke to experts about what they’ll be watching as the debate turns to economic issues, and they said they’ll be paying attention to everything from the amount of substantive discussion to the importance of Biden’s accomplishments to the breadth of topics like inflation and taxes.
Here are some economic takeaways to watch in the Trump-Harris debate, experts say:
Hot and cold
With a few exceptions, polls have generally shown that voters tend to prefer Trump over Harris on economic issues, though Harris has been closing the gap between Trump and President Joe Biden in the early stages of the campaign.
The trend coincides with Republicans outnumbering Democrats by 14 percentage points on the issue of keeping the country prosperous, a trend that a Gallup poll last year found gave Republicans their largest lead since 1991, when polling on the issue began.
In theory, Trump’s economic advantage could give him a beneficial piece of the debate, some experts told ABC News, but they added that any potential gains could be minimized or negated by Trump’s tendency to go off-message, make personal attacks and make false claims.
“He has to stay on message,” Peter Morici, professor emeritus at the University of Maryland School of Management, told ABC News. “If he’s prepared, he can put[Harris]in a position where it’s hard to argue against.”
The debate is unlikely to delve into policy finer points, said Steve Bommes, founder and president of Alon Advocacy, a Washington, D.C.-based consulting firm. Instead of trying to avoid the specifics of the issues that voters support Trump for, Harris may pursue substantive dialogue to demonstrate superior understanding of the issues.
“The debates with former President Trump have not led to much substantive policy discussion thus far,” Boms said. “It will be a challenge for VP Harris to use the policy debates as a way to contrast her policies with his.”
Biden’s Legacy
Among other issues, some experts say the economy presents Harris with important choices about how much to embrace Biden’s record and how much to distance herself from it.
With many Americans unhappy with Biden’s economic policies, Harris may try to break away from the status quo by acknowledging Americans’ economic pain and offering policy proposals to address it, experts added.
President Trump’s relative strength on this issue is partly due to the worsening of consumer attitudes about the economy since he left office.
A University of Michigan survey found consumer sentiment hit about 68 points last month. While that marks an improvement from the lowest mark recorded in 2022, the reading remains well below the 80 points recorded in the final month of President Trump’s term and the 101 points recorded before the pandemic.
“The main dynamic is that Harris is trying to cherry-pick the aspects of Biden’s record that she wants to highlight and avoid taking responsibility for the things people want to blame Biden for,” said Matt Grossman, a political science professor at Michigan State University who studies the role of economic performance in electoral politics.
“How much new policy will Harris be able to offer, rather than just continuing the same policies?” Grossman added.
inflation
Some experts have said inflation could be a major topic of discussion in the economic portion of the debate, noting that candidates have frequently mentioned concerns about prices during the campaign.
While price growth has slowed dramatically from its peak in June 2022, inflation remains about a percentage point above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target. Moreover, consumer prices have risen by more than 20% since Biden took office, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
“Of all the economic issues, inflation is President Trump’s biggest problem,” Stephen Roach, a senior fellow at the Paul Tsai China Center at Yale Law School, told ABC News.
“Inflation has come down much faster than most people expected,” Roach added. “The problem is that price levels remain unacceptably high.”
Harris last month unveiled proposals aimed at easing inflation by targeting the prices of food, housing and medicines. The plan includes high-profile proposals such as a ban on food price gouging and a $25,000 grant for first-time home buyers.
“She’s put forward some proposals to try to target some of the areas where inflation is occurring,” Michigan State University’s Grossman said, “and that has allowed her so far to not take on as much responsibility for inflation as she did before Biden left.”
Tax proposals
While policy details remain unclear in some areas, both candidates have put forward some proposals for how to approach taxes.
President Trump has vowed to restore his signature tax cuts and eliminate taxes on tips and Social Security payments.
Harris, meanwhile, has also said she would repeal the tax on tips, reject Trump’s tax law renewal, promised to raise corporate taxes, and proposed a 28% tax on long-term capital gains, significantly lower than Biden’s proposed 39.6% tax rate on long-term capital gains.
During the debate, both candidates will likely position their tax reform plans as an effort to improve the prospects of the working and middle-class, according to Alon Advocacy’s Bommes. Trump may argue that his tax reform plan helped boost worker wages during his presidency, while Harris could point out that corporations could end up paying higher tax rates, he said.
Morici said both candidates will tout tax cuts for ordinary citizens.
“When you say, ‘We’re giving you more money back from the U.S. government,’ there’s a reaction,” he said.