McDonald’s is the latest battlefield in the Trump-Harris fight to reach low-wage voters

Donald Trump’s campaign event Sunday at a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania highlighted his battle with Kamala Harris to court a coveted group of working-class voters who have the potential to decide the outcome of the presidential election in a critical swing state.

To win them over, the former president is seeking to make the election a referendum on the Biden-Harris administration’s record, while the vice president hopes to make it a choice between two contrasting agendas. Harris is pushing an expansion of the child tax credit, a subsidy for first-time homebuyers, a higher minimum wage and guaranteed paid leave, while the former president is calling for extending his tax cuts and slashing regulations in order to lower energy bills.

Data shows lower-wage workers — like ones who work at fast-food restaurants — have a lower propensity to vote. In fact, it’s a nearly linear relationship: The less money you make, the less likely you are to have shown up at the polls, according to Tufts University. Both candidates are trying to persuade and juice those voters in the final weeks before the election, and the image of Trump serving fries to supporters at a McDonald’s drive-thru was an attempt by the wealthy real estate mogul to reach out to the voters who will make or break his ambitions to return to the White House.

According to McDonald’s, approximately 1 in 8 Americans has worked at the fast-food chain at some point.

With the economy and cost of living consistently ranking as top issues, especially for persuadable voters, the two candidates’ economic agendas for wage earners could determine how these pivotal voters in battleground states cast their ballots.

Lower-wage workers would benefit more under plans put forward by Harris than those offered by Trump, according to an analysis of the policies the two candidates have provided by the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School.

“When you’re looking at direct policies, there’s no question that Harris is a little bit more skewed towards lower-income workers,” said Kent Smetters, a business professor who worked on the analysis.

The lowest-earning 20% of households could receive an average of $2,300 in various federal incentives under Harris’ plan, compared to around $350 under Trump’s plan, said Smetters. The incentives under Harris include an increase to the child tax credit, health care subsidies and assistance for first-time homebuyers.

But some of those gains by lower-wage workers under Harris would be offset by slightly slower wage growth as a result of a higher corporate tax rate that Harris is also proposing, compared with Trump, said Smetters. When factoring in that slower wage growth, lower-wage workers would see a benefit of around $1,750 more per year under Harris than Trump, he said.

Trump has offered more vague ways in which he would improve the overall economy, like cuts to regulations and lower corporate taxes that he has said would spur business investment. It is unclear though how those would translate into a benefit for lower-wage workers.

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