From Goldman Sachs research, this is Alison Nathan.

Welcome to Top of Mind, a podcast that explores macroeconomic issues on the minds of our clients.

In this episode, we're focusing on the policy implications of the fast approaching U.S. presidential

election, which is shaping up to be one of the most contentious and consequential in modern history.

Given the candidates' radically different worldviews, the potential impact of the election on policy,

and in turn, the economy is top of mind.

To start, I tried to get a sense of the economic policy priorities of the candidates by speaking

with policy experts from each party. Kevin Hassett, former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors

under President Trump and Jared Bernstein, economic advisor to former

Vice President Biden. Beginning with the incumbent, I asked Hassett what re-election would mean

for President Trump's economic agenda.

The president has talked a lot about his priorities for a second term, and I think

on taxes, there are a number of things expiring that I'm sure he would want

to make permanent. On tax rates, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act ended up being a little bit short

of the rates the president pursued. No, I haven't heard that he wants to take a second stab

at that, but I would expect another tax proposal of some type that would include additional middle class tax cuts.

And finally, one of the things we worked out of the White House the most while I was there that didn't end up becoming legislation was a big infrastructure plan.

The president's passionate about infrastructure. There's probably about a year of meetings in the Roosevelt room to come up with an infrastructure plan. The president's passionate about infrastructure. There's probably about a

year of meetings in the Roosevelt room to come up with an infrastructure plan. And I think that

in a second term, it'd be pretty likely that he would pursue it. Finally, we have to keep an eye on the

economy and on whether there's a COVID vaccine and whether everything gets back to normal

relatively quickly

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