Survey Says is a weekly sequence rounding up an important polling tendencies or knowledge factors it is advisable learn about, plus a vibe test on a pattern that’s driving politics or tradition.
Video gaming is getting dearer, and two reviled entities maintain a lot of the blame: President Donald Trump and the synthetic intelligence business. And such inflation is barely unhealthy information for the Republican Social gathering forward of this yr’s midterms.
All three main recreation consoles have seen their costs enhance drastically over the previous 15 months, beginning shortly after Trump introduced his wide-ranging “Liberation Day” tariffs on April 2, 2025.
Beginning this August, Microsoft’s Xbox Sequence X with 1 TB of storage will probably be $300 dearer than it was when the console launched at $499.99 in November 2020. It will likely be the floundering console’s fourth worth hike in that point. The primary time arrived a couple of month after Trump’s tariff announcement, with Microsoft citing “market circumstances.”
Within the days main as much as Trump’s so-called Liberation Day, the Leisure Software program Affiliation—the online game business’s commerce affiliation—printed a press release decrying the administration’s plans.
“Tariffs on online game units and associated merchandise would negatively affect a whole lot of hundreds of thousands of Individuals and would hurt the business’s vital contributions to the U.S. economic system,” the assertion learn.
Over the previous 15 months, related worth hikes have hit Sony’s PlayStation 5 and Nintendo’s Swap 2 as nicely. The worth of a normal PS5 with a disc drive is now $150 increased than at launch, and the price of the Swap 2, which was launched solely a couple of yr in the past, will soar by $50 in September. Swap 2 controllers and different equipment additionally received dearer attributable to Trump’s tariffs, as did sure Xbox equipment and video games.
Even Nintendo’s unique Swap noticed its worth enhance by $40 final August, greater than eight years after its launch. The Japanese gaming large chalked it as much as—you guessed it—“market circumstances.”
Traditionally, recreation consoles get cheaper with time. For example, lower than three years after its 2006 debut, the PlayStation 3 value $200 much less—and had double the cupboard space. In different phrases, players received a greater product for much less.
Now they’re getting a fairly related product for way more.
“The Trump administration’s 2025 tariffs sparked the primary wave of worth will increase on online game consoles,” Wirecutter, a product-review web site run by The New York Instances, not too long ago defined. “Whereas many electronics producers … secured exceptions for his or her merchandise, the makers of online game {hardware} didn’t obtain the identical reprieve—and the international locations the place consoles are sometimes manufactured, together with China and Taiwan, had been topic to notably excessive tariff charges.”
However Trump doesn’t maintain the blame by himself. Simply because the Supreme Court docket struck down a lot of his tariffs, the AI increase has precipitated “RAM-ageddon.” AI knowledge facilities are getting dropped in neighborhoods throughout the nation, a buildout that’s gobbling up reminiscence chips, often known as RAM. And because the provide shrinks, the costs have skyrocketed.
The scarcity started in earnest this previous fall. The typical worth of two 16 GB sticks of DDR5-4800 RAM was round $100 final September, in keeping with price-monitoring web site PCPartPicker. However by this January, it was over $400.
The disaster is spiking costs throughout client electronics. For example, Apple is elevating the price of its computer systems and iPhones by a whole lot of {dollars}.
Information facilities, as with the AI know-how they assist, are extensively reviled. Seventy-one p.c of Individuals oppose a knowledge middle being constructed of their space, in keeping with Gallup in Could. And solely 32% of Individuals assume AI may have a primarily optimistic impact on society, per a brand new YouGov ballot.
However not solely are these worth hikes half of a bigger inflation disaster below Trump, which is hobbling his approval score forward of this yr’s midterm elections, the will increase are notably felt amongst younger males, a voting bloc Trump efficiently courted in 2024. Within the 2020 election, he misplaced males ages 18 to 29 by 10 share factors, however 4 years later, he received them by 1 level, in keeping with the Pew Analysis Heart.Â
Now, a lot of these Trump-voting younger males are feeling the sting of inflation hit a high interest, and so they aren’t completely happy. Simply 32% of younger male voters ages 18 to 29 accredited of the job Trump was doing as president, per a survey fielded in December 2025 by HIT Methods and the centrist group Third Means.
The inflated value of gaming will probably be highlighted additional within the days main as much as the midterms. Grand Theft Auto VI, anticipated to be one of many largest leisure releases in historical past, will debut on Nov. 19, at $80 in its commonplace version, $10 increased than is typical for brand new video games. An “final version,” that includes extras like unique in-game outlets, will are available at $100. Including insult to damage, should you purchase a duplicate of GTA VI in shops, the case received’t include a disc. All you’ll discover is a code for a digital obtain. (Sadly, that is how all new PlayStation video games will probably be, beginning in 2028.)
No matter whether or not Trump continues to be the primary motive for growing costs in video gaming, he and his Republican Social gathering may very nicely face voters’ wrath over it. They could simply inform the GOP, as Trump himself put it in a cringey “Apprentice”-style skit that performed on the 2004 Digital Leisure Expo, “You’re all fired. Look, I’m sorry, it’s over. Get out.”
Any updates?
Regardless of Trump’s failure to offer America a correct 250th birthday, most Individuals stay completely happy their nation isn’t a monarchy, just like the one it was a part of earlier than the American Revolution. A brand new YouGov ballot finds that 65% of Individuals assume it might’ve been a nasty factor for the U.S. to have its personal monarchy for the previous 250 years. Not as excessive as you would possibly anticipate. Regardless of their alleged patriotism, Republicans (59%) are much less seemingly than Democrats (75%) to say it might have been a nasty factor.
Minnesota is a blue state, however is it a progressive state? This yr’s Democratic Senate main could take a look at that concept, as progressive Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan and reasonable Rep. Angie Craig sq. off. Current polls are very a lot a choose-your-own-adventure. A brand new one from Public Coverage Polling and a pro-Flanagan group—the Democratic Lt. Gov. Affiliation, which she chairs—finds her up 7 factors over Craig, whereas one other current ballot from SurveyUSA and a bunch of native media shops finds Craig up 5 factors. One of many dividing points between Craig and Flanagan has been healthcare: Flanagan helps Medicare for All, whereas Craig prefers a public choice.
One yr after Trump and the GOP gutted Medicaid, a majority of Individuals need the federal government to go full single-payer. Within the newest Economist/YouGov ballot, 52% of Individuals assist the creation of “a nationwide well being plan through which all Individuals get their medical health insurance from the federal authorities and personal medical health insurance corporations are eradicated”—a very blunt query wording that solely highlights the attraction of a plan like Medicare for All. Much more spectacular: Not solely do 73% of Democrats and 54% of independents assist such a coverage, so do 30% of Republicans.
After 1,592 days of attempting to repel Russia’s invasion of their homeland, Ukrainians are sick of coping with Trump. Simply 7% of Ukrainians approve of the present management within the U.S., in keeping with Gallup. That marks a 59-point slide from its excessive of 66% approval in 2022, when Joe Biden was president.
Vibe test
Individuals are divided over who’s the best American of the previous 250 years—however much less so over who the worst is.
YouGov requested Individuals to vote on one of the best and worst Individuals for the reason that nation’s founding, devising the record of names from an open-ended query included in a earlier survey.
Eighteen p.c named Abraham Lincoln as one of the best American, with George Washington (13%) and Martin Luther King Jr. (12%) shut behind.
However relating to the worst American of the previous 250, 34% of Individuals picked Trump. The second-worst, with a comparably low 14%, was accused intercourse trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
Past easy recency bias, Individuals even have extra instant expertise with figures like Trump and Epstein, in contrast with Lincoln murderer John Wilkes Sales space. Equally, different extra modern figures, like cult chief Charles Manson and serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, had far smaller particular person impacts on America than Trump.
Who do you assume is the best American for the reason that nation’s founding? Who’s the worst?
