Democratic vice presidential candidate and Minnesota governor Tim Walz (L) and Republican vice presidential candidate Sen. JD Vance (R-OH).
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Housing
Affordable housing is an important issue for many Americans, and both Walz and Vance have addressed the issue.
In May 2023, Walz signed housing legislation which included $200 million in advance aid. The bill also had $200 million for housing infrastructure and $40 million for workforce housing.
“We expect Walz to be a champion of demand-side approaches to housing,” TD Cowen analyst Jaret Seiberg wrote in a July statement. “These are the housing ideas we would expect from a Harris administration,” he wrote.
Demand-side approaches to housing aim to help individual households by improving housing quality or reducing monthly housing costs.
Meanwhile, Vance, who is also an advocate for affordable housing, highlighted the issue in his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention and throughout the campaign.
“Prior to his Senate run, Vance has argued that one key to addressing poverty is addressing affordable housing” and has opposed institutional ownership of rental housing and Chinese buyers of U.S. real estate, Seiberg wrote.
Child tax credit
Without action from Congress, trillions in tax breaks enacted by Trump are scheduled to expire after 2025, including the child tax credit, which will be reduced from $2,000 to $1,000 per child.
Congress in 2021 approved a temporary extension of the child tax credit, including advance monthly payments, which reduced the child poverty rate to a record low of 5.2% for 2021, according to a Columbia University analysis.
Following federal policy, Minnesota enacted a statewide refundable child tax credit in 2023, which Walz described as “signature achievement.”
Minnesota’s new child tax credit is unusual in its narrowness, but it is the most generous in the country for low-income households.
Jared Walczak
Vice President of Government Projects at the Tax Foundation
“Minnesota’s new child tax credit is unusual because of its narrowness,” said Jared Walczak, vice president of state projects at the Tax Foundation. “But it’s the most generous in the country for low-income households.”
But a permanent federal expansion of the child tax credit could be difficult, particularly amid a divided Congress and growing concerns about the federal budget deficit.
Walz’s campaign did not respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
Senate Republicans blocked an expansion of the federal child tax credit last week, and Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, described the vote as “a blatant attempt to score political points.”
Despite the failed procedural vote, Crapo expressed his willingness to negotiate a “child tax credit solution that the majority of Republicans can support.”
Democrats scheduled the vote in part reply to Vancewho has positioned himself as a pro-family candidate. Vance was not present for the Senate vote, but voiced his support for the child tax credit.
Vance’s campaign did not respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
Student loans
Vance has spoken out against student loan forgiveness policies.
“Student debt forgiveness is a huge windfall for the wealthy, the college-educated, and most of all, America’s corrupt university administrators,” said Vance, a graduate of Yale Law School. he wrote at X in April 2022. “Republicans must fight this with every ounce of our energy and strength.”
Pending education debt in the US it is about 1.6 trillion dollars. Nearly 43 million people — or 1 in 6 American adults — carry student loans. Women and people of color are burdened the most by debt.
Vance seems to approve of loan forgiveness in extreme cases. In May, he helped legislate which would relieve parents of student loans taken out for a child who became permanently disabled.
Jane Fox, president of the UAW local 2325 chapter of the Legal Aid Society attorneys union, said it was hypocritical and wrong for Vance to characterize the debt relief as a benefit for those on welfare.
“Student debt relief is a working-class issue,” Fox said. “Those 1% who went to elite institutions and then worked in private equity like Senator Vance rarely needed debt relief.”
Vance’s campaign did not respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
Meanwhile, Walz, a former school teacher, has advocated for programs to ease people’s student debt burden, said higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz.
Signed a Student loan forgiveness program for nurses in Minnesota, Kantrowitz said, as well initiative for free tuition for low-income students.
“As my daughter prepares to head off to college next year, affordability and student loan debt are at the forefront of our minds,” Walz said. he wrote on Facebook in 2018. “Every Minnesotan deserves a great education without skyrocketing costs and student loan debt.”
