The buzzword of the month is “affordability,” and based on the election results from New York, New Jersey and Virginia, voters think that’s declining. Democrats think they’ve found a winning issue to win back the hearts and minds of voters.

It’s true that people are angry about prices. But who’s to blame? President Donald Trump said he would bring prices down; that hasn’t happened. His tariffs have nudged up prices on certain products like coffee and cars. But since Trump came into office in January, the inflation rate has fallen. If we go back to the start of COVID-19, we find that much of the rise in prices of everything you buy is because of Biden inflation, not Trump inflation.

It’s important to remember why inflation soared to a high of 9% under Biden. He launched a $4 trillion spending spree (remember Build Back Better?), and that was all paid for by printing and borrowing money, which caused inflation to spike.

It’s ironic that Democrats have picked up on the affordability theme, because we know that in states where Democrats rule, inflation tends to spiral out of control.

The U.S. News & World Report ratings show nine of the 10 most expensive states are either blue or purple states. New Hampshire is the one outlier. Meanwhile, all 10 of the lowest-cost states are run by Republicans.

The five lowest-cost states are Arkansas, South Dakota, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Louisiana.

The five highest-cost states are California, New York, Massachusetts, Illinois and New Jersey.

But blue states tend to have higher costs not just because they are richer. It’s because liberal policies raise costs. Blue states have higher taxes, and some of those costs get passed on to consumers. The states with the highest income tax — California, New York and New Jersey — are all at the top of the list of most expensive states.

Blue states are more likely to have high minimum wage requirements, higher energy costs due to expensive “green” renewable energy mandates, stricter forced union policies and high-cost regulations that restrict new housing, which raises the cost of buying a home in these areas.

Electricity costs are on average twice as high in states like California, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Washington because of their climate change policies that restrict cheap energy that is commonplace in states like Texas and Utah.

These are just a few examples of how Democratic politicians make products more, not less, expensive.

Middle-class consumers pay a high price for progressive and anti-business policies in the state capitals.

So if you’re in search of lower prices and want to make your paycheck go further, one failsafe strategy is to move to a conservative place with free-market policies.

Suddenly you will see that everything is a lot more “affordable.”