Wall Street Week | Affordability, Data Center Divide, Debt Hits Households, Capitalism on the Ballot
Channel: Bloomberg Television
Uploaded:
Duration not recorded
Read a transcript preview of “Wall Street Week | Affordability, Data Center Divide, Debt Hits Households, Capitalism on the Ballot” from Bloomberg Television, uploaded on 2026-10-30.
Transcript preview
Language: English (original, creator captions)
[0:12] David Westin: This is "Wall Street Week."
[0:14] I'm David Westin, bringing you stories of capitalism.
[0:16] This week, a special hour on the U.S. midterm elections,
[0:20] as voters choose all 435 members of Congress,
[0:23] 35 senators, and 36 state governors.
[0:27] Tip O'Neill famously said that all politics is local,
[0:30] and this election is no exception.
[0:33] But halfway through President Trump's second term,
[0:36] there are a handful of themes that have dominated
[0:38] the campaigning across the country,
[0:40] from data centers, to interest rates, to tariffs,
[0:43] to whether we still trust the markets
[0:45] to sort out our priorities as a nation.
[0:48] And we start with the one topic
[0:50] at the very center of this election.
[0:52] Wherever you go,
[0:53] the vast majority of voters in both parties
[0:55] say the economy is their top issue
[0:58] as they head to the polls.
[0:59] And for most Americans, that comes down to one word.
[1:03] -Affordability. -Affordability.
[1:04] -Affordability. -Affordability issues.
[1:06] -Affordability crisis.
[1:07] -Every single election headline you get
[1:10] is going to be about affordability.
[1:11] Westin: New polls out this month show almost half of Americans
[1:15] struggle to afford basic necessities
[1:17] like food and medical care.
[1:19] And most households, even wealthier ones,
[1:22] say they've cut back spending on extras
[1:24] like entertainment and eating out
[1:26] over the past year.
[1:27] -Inflation picked back up.
[1:29] Like, that's really been the pressure point,
[1:31] and people haven't been able to adjust
[1:33] by getting bigger paychecks.
[1:35] -Inflation is intolerably high.
[1:38] Westin: Economists, including Harvard's Jason Furman,
[1:41] point