3 charts highlight the affordability issues Americans worry about most

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President Trump is expected to absorption connected the system during his 2026 State of the Union code connected Tuesday evening — an urgent taxable of interest for millions of Americans who accidental they're disquieted astir everything from the terms of nutrient to spiraling wellness attraction costs.

The address, which will aerial astatine 9 p.m. EDT, volition item the spot of the U.S. economy, with White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt saying connected Tuesday greeting that the president volition outline plans to "make the American imagination much attainable."

By accepted metrics, the system looks resilient. Unemployment remains low astatine 4.3%; ostentation is cooling; and GDP is expanding, with the U.S. mostly shrugging disconnected the interaction of tariffs that economists feared could trigger a recession. Consumers — whose spending keeps the system humming — besides study feeling more confident of precocious amid a burst in January occupation creation.

At the aforesaid time, galore households inactive study grappling with stubbornly precocious prices for essentials similar food, lodging and wellness insurance, a disconnect that underscores the situation Mr. Trump faces successful touting his economical record.

Mr. Trump has offered a scope of proposals to code affordability issues. Yet immoderate of the astir disposable initiatives, specified arsenic a propulsion to headdress credit paper rates astatine 10%, person yet to amusement benefits, Bankrate elder economical expert Mark Hamrick said successful an email.

Americans polled by the Pew Research Center successful January said their apical economical concerns are the outgo of food, lodging and wellness care.

Food prices

The outgo of nutrient has been a flashpoint for consumers since ostentation soared to a 40-year precocious successful 2022. High nutrient prices besides bedeviled erstwhile President Biden, prompting Mr. Trump to vow portion connected the run way that helium would extremity the "inflation nightmare."

Since Mr. Trump returned to bureau successful 2025, nutrient prices person continued to climb, though astatine a slower gait than nether the Biden administration, erstwhile pandemic-related proviso disruptions drove terms hikes.

But economists person agelong noted that shoppers thin to beryllium much focused connected the prices they spot connected store shelves than the complaint of inflation. Although nutrient costs are rising much slowly, prices of immoderate staples person continued emergence sharply successful the past year: Ground beef has jumped 17.2% from a twelvemonth ago, portion java has surged 18.3%.

The Trump medication has sought to antagonistic rising nutrient prices successful portion by exempting beef, java and bananas from tariffs. Earlier this month, Mr. Trump besides said helium would boost U.S. imports of beef from Argentina successful an effort to easiness prices.

Because beef imports from Argentina correspond lone 0.6% of the wide U.S. beef supply, that argumentation is unlikely to determination the needle connected prices, experts person told CBS News.

Housing affordability

More than 8 successful 10 Americans accidental it is harder contiguous to bargain a location than it was for earlier generations, according to a CBS News poll that surveyed consumers successful aboriginal February. Pew besides recently found that 62% of Americans study feeling acrophobic astir the outgo of housing.

The Trump medication has projected respective remedies, including banning organization investors from purchasing single-family homes. The president has besides directed the national authorities to bargain $200 cardinal successful owe securities, a determination that could assistance little the outgo of location loans.

Experts accidental that those ideas whitethorn supply immoderate relief, but aren't apt connected their ain to code the deeper contented down rising location prices: a shortage of affordable housing. Homebuilding cratered aft the Great Recession successful 2008-09 and has ne'er caught up with demand.

The U.S. would request to physique arsenic galore arsenic 4 cardinal further homes beyond the mean gait of operation to importantly trim the lodging shortage, Goldman Sachs analysts estimate.

Health attraction spending

Paying for wellness attraction has emerged arsenic Americans' apical fiscal interest aft Congress failed past twelvemonth to widen some Affordable Care Act subsidies, triggering premium spikes for millions, wellness argumentation probe steadfast KFF recovered successful a caller poll.

Meanwhile, workers with employer-sponsored wellness security look increases of astir 6% to 7% successful 2026 — much than treble the current complaint of inflation. Since 2008, the outgo of backstage wellness security has astir doubled, KFF found.

Millions who trust connected the Affordable Care Act marketplaces for security plans faced adjacent sharper spikes aft Congress failed to widen enhanced premium subsidies, which expired Dec. 31. Some Americans told CBS News they planned to skip coverage this twelvemonth due to the fact that they couldn't spend their soaring premiums.

The Trump medication is tackling cause costs done its caller TrumpRx website, which lists little direct-to-consumer medicine prices. Mr. Trump described the tract arsenic "one of the astir transformative wellness attraction initiatives of each time."

But experts enactment that the tract is geared to consumers who wage retired of pocket, meaning that it doesn't assistance radical with security and won't number toward gathering a consumer's wellness program deductible.

The Republicans' "big, beauteous bill" enactment besides paid for taxation cuts by importantly trimming spending connected Medicaid and different societal programs, Vanessa Williamson, elder chap astatine the nonpartisan Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, noted successful an email.

"When you adhd to that the refusal to widen the Affordable Care Act credits, which caused wellness security premiums to treble for millions of Americans, and the cuts to affordable vigor programs, you tin spot Americans were truly deed successful their wallets implicit the past year," she said.

Edited by Alain Sherter

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