Voters in 42 states on Election Day will decide an assortment of ballot measures, also known as initiatives or issues, that cover various largely polarizing political issues. Voters in five states—Alaska, Arkansas, Illinois, Nebraska, and South Dakota—will decide ballot measures to increase those states’ minimum wage. Each measure would increase the minimum wage above the federally mandated minimum wage of $7.25 per hour, but how far above that threshold and the timeline for the increases vary by state.

Polls, while not comprehensive, suggest the proposals are likely to pass, even though the four states in question (Alaska, Arkansas, Nebraska and South Dakota) are strongly Republican and Republican officials have tended to resist minimum wage increases. There is no recent public polling in Nebraska. In the other three states, a higher minimum wage leads by a wide margin: by 61 percent to 33 percent in Alaska and 68 to 24 in Arkansas, according to September polls from Public Policy Polling, and by 60 to 28 in South Dakota, according to an October SurveyUSA poll.