People’s pocketbooks are not just top of mind at the grocery store, gas station or dinner table. They’ll be paramount at the polls this election cycle.

A plurality of Georgia voters see economic issues, including inflation and the cost of living, as the most important factors driving their choice in November’s presidential election, according to a poll conducted for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The survey found Donald Trump with a slight lead in Georgia over President Joe Biden, although voters were split among ideological and partisan lines on who they blamed for sticker shock and any perceived financial woes.

Inflation spiked globally amid recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. While price increases have been painful, the U.S. has fared far better than most developed countries. By most measures, the U.S. economy is historically strong. The unemployment rate in the U.S. and in Georgia are also lower than they were before the pandemic when Trump was president.

Many voters who spoke with the AJC in interviews ahead of Thursday’s first presidential debate said the pandemic intensified economic hardships, but only some have felt the subsequent recovery. Some acknowledged the pandemic has clouded how everyone views the economy.

“The economy has been pretty (expletive),” said Barton Mingledorff, a 41-year-old craft beer salesman and jujitsu coach in Newton County who plans to vote for Trump. “But it’s always going to be clear as mud because you had the pandemic.”

The survey, which included conversations with 1,000 likely voters from June 11-20, was administered by the University of Georgia’s School of Public and International Affairs. The poll has a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points.

Many issues swirl around the race between Democratic incumbent Biden and Trump, his Republican predecessor in the White House. But a combined about 42% of respondents said the most crucial issues for them are economic — 26% pegging the cost of living and 16% selecting jobs.

Those worries overshadowed questions about Trump’s felony conviction in New York, his support for the Jan. 6 insurrection, as well as his appointment of U.S. Supreme Court justices who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade. The economy also eclipsed arguments about Biden’s handling of the nation’s border.

“I don’t think that presidents have as much influence on the economy as people think,” said Steve Dorvee, a 67-year-old retired lawyer from Fulton County. He described himself as a “Reagan Republican” who will be voting for Biden.

“There’s some hiccups, but his unemployment numbers have stayed low, and the stock market has cruised right along,” he continued. “(The economy) seems to be doing well, but people don’t believe it.”

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