With the presidential election of either Kamala Harris or Donald Trump just months away, the power to touch every business and consumer in the U.S., plus billions more worldwide, is up for grabs in November. With both political parties eager to reshape U.S. engagement in the global economy, how do the two candidates differ, and who’s going to be best for the American consumers and businesses?
This piece was originally reported by Geoff Colvin.
This piece was originally reported by Geoff Colvin.
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00:00Just a few months ago, as Trump and Biden walked onto the debate stage,
00:03the election we were expecting was looking like a boring rerun.
00:06He challenged me to a golf match. He can't hit a ball 50 yards.
00:09I told you before, I'm happy to play golf if you carry your own bag. Think you can do it?
00:13But now...
00:14We go to breaking news of an apparent shooting at a rally for former U.S. President Donald Trump.
00:23Donald Trump has made his choice. Ohio Senator J.D. Vance will be his running mate.
00:29We're effectively run in this country by a bunch of childless cat ladies.
00:33In this unprecedented campaign, this season the likes of which we have never seen before.
00:38President Biden has just announced that he is ending his re-election bid.
00:42The president in a tweet just announcing that he is offering his
00:45full support and endorsement for Kamala Harris.
00:48You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?
00:50Kamala Harris announces Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate.
00:55These guys are just weird.
00:56Now, with two vastly different candidates, there's two possible futures for the country
01:00depending on who wins the presidency this November.
01:04But with over one out of every three voters citing either inflation,
01:07jobs or the economy as the most important issue on their mind,
01:10it's clear that Americans are focused on their wallets in 2024.
01:16To get insights on the differences between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump,
01:19we spoke with Fortune's senior editor-at-large.
01:22I'm Jeff Colvin.
01:22I recently wrote an article about the two candidates for the presidency
01:27and which one would be best for business.
01:30Probably the biggest economic issue that will face the next president, whoever it is,
01:36involves a tax bill that was enacted in 2017.
01:40A big, once-in-a-generation kind of tax bill.
01:43And it is scheduled to expire at the end of next year, the end of 2025.
01:49When it passed, the bill did cut taxes for a vast majority of Americans,
01:53regardless of their income level.
01:55But since 2017, the perception of that law has been mixed,
01:58with many saying it favors the wealthy.
02:00Supporters of the bill, particularly the Republicans trying to pass it,
02:03originally defended these high-income and corporate tax cuts
02:06by assuring the benefits would trickle down.
02:08How are these tax cuts going to help the blue-collar worker?
02:10We're going to give this business an ability to write off the investments
02:14that they make in this business to buy more machines, to hire more workers, to raise wages.
02:18But data from 2018 showed it had, quote,
02:20very little effect on wages.
02:22And in 2022, the Tax Policy Center reported that extending the law
02:26would add $3 trillion to the federal debt,
02:29while a majority of the tax cuts would benefit the wealthy.
02:32Republicans in general are in favor of not letting it expire.
02:36The Democrats in general are in favor of letting it expire.
02:40If it does expire, taxes on non-corporate businesses,
02:45like sole proprietorships, will go up.
02:48Taxes on corporations could go up.
02:51Personal income taxes would go up for high-income people,
02:56and maybe for not-so-high-income people as well.
03:00But taxes aren't the only economic policy Harris and Trump disagree on.
03:04There's a few other ways the candidates differ
03:06that will have huge influences on the economy.
03:09Other big economic issues that will face the next president include labor.
03:14The Democrats have generally been very pro-labor,
03:18and it must be said that President Biden
03:20has absolutely been the most pro-labor president ever.
03:25It's true.
03:26Despite criticism over his handling of a 2022 railroad strike,
03:29Biden has continued to make headlines throughout his term for pro-labor actions,
03:33including becoming the first president in history to stand on a picket line.
03:37And even though Biden is no longer in the race,
03:39it's very likely that Kamala would hold similar stances on labor.
03:43Donald Trump, on the other hand,
03:44is trying to attract members of labor unions to vote for him.
03:49But the labor unions themselves have been very, very against him.
03:54The AFL-CIO called his term as president,
03:58catastrophic.
03:59And on top of labor,
04:00Harris and Trump both differ on immigration and regulation,
04:03both of which are particularly important to CEOs and business leaders.
04:07Under Biden, there have been enormous numbers of people
04:11coming to the southern border.
04:13And in recent months, he has tried to change his policy there.
04:16I'm certain that Kamala Harris will want to continue getting this under control.
04:22Donald Trump was very tough on immigration when he was president.
04:26Trump has said he would launch the biggest deportation ever.
04:30It's worth mentioning, however, that when he was president last time,
04:35he also said he was going to impose an enormous deportation.
04:40And he simply didn't do it.
04:42Another issue that's of great importance to business is regulation.
04:47When Donald Trump was president, he pulled back on regulation.
04:53And I've spoken to many CEOs who say,
04:55yes, absolutely, from the day Donald Trump became president,
05:00they could feel the difference when they were dealing with the regulatory authorities.
05:04President Biden has gone the other way.
05:06He's made the regulatory authorities much more active,
05:10making things, frankly, tougher for business.
05:13Similarly, if Harris becomes president,
05:16she will almost certainly continue the very activist regulatory policy
05:21that Biden has had.
05:22But despite all their differences,
05:24there's one thing Kamala Harris and Donald Trump both agree on,
05:27and it's costing Americans billions of dollars.
05:30Tariffs.
05:31A tariff is a tax, in essence, so that if a company in the United States
05:37wants to buy something from another country,
05:40then the company here in the U.S. has to pay something to the U.S. Treasury.
05:46So politicians on both sides of the aisle
05:50take advantage of this widespread belief
05:52that tariffs are paid by the exporting country.
05:56For example, Trump, now candidate Trump,
05:59has said the tariffs he imposed on China
06:01brought billions of dollars into the U.S. Treasury, which is true.
06:05But he doesn't mention that those billions of dollars didn't come from China.
06:10They came from people and companies, consumers, employees in the United States.
06:16Strangely, both of the major political parties in America
06:19have abandoned nearly eight decades of focus on free trade
06:22and have chosen to embrace tariffs.
06:24The Peterson Institute for International Economics
06:28estimated that the Trump tariffs are costing a middle-level household
06:33about $1,700 a year.
06:37Now, that calculation hasn't been done for the current Biden tariffs specifically.
06:42However, those tariffs are still quite similar.
06:45But if it's costing their voters thousands every year, why are they doing this?
06:49Well, both candidates want to look tough on one particular country.
06:53China.
06:54Trump started this trade war in 2018,
06:58and he had famously said trade wars are good and easy to win.
07:05It was not just the Trump administration that liked it,
07:08because when Biden became president,
07:11he made a lot of changes to Trump's policies,
07:15but he barely touched the tough tariffs.
07:18Think about what happened in just the past couple years
07:22when inflation became a really serious problem here in the United States
07:25for the first time in a long time.
07:27One clear way to try to reduce that is to reduce tariffs.
07:32And yet, they didn't do it.
07:34Those tariffs are very important politically
07:37because they show that the administration is being tough on China,
07:41which counts for a lot in politics today.
07:46So with all this in mind,
07:47when determining who was the best candidate for Americans' wallets,
07:50there's not really a simple solution.
07:52Consumers are clear losers from tariffs.
07:55Tariffs simply increase costs.
07:58As far as which candidate would be the best president for business,
08:04it's not an easy answer to come up with.
08:07CEOs are looking at it as pretty much a flip of the coin.
08:12And frankly, they won't quite say this, CEOs won't quite say it,
08:15but they don't really like either one.
08:18They find different things to dislike about the two candidates,
08:23but it's hard to say which one they like best,
08:28or maybe I should say worse.