Prime Minister Scott Morrison is blaming Australia's cost of living crisis on inflation which he says is outside his control.
But Australians cannot risk electing an opposition whose policies would drive up inflation, Mr Morrison said.
"Wages are rising and will rise. The challenge is inflation and that's a global challenge," he told reporters in Geelong on Wednesday.
"A shadow treasurer who thinks you can just have a few billion dollars loosely spraying around and it's no big deal, well, that is a big risk to you."
Wages are at the forefront of the campaign days out from the election as statistics are expected to show pay packets growing at half the rate of inflation.
The prime minister said the way to increase wages was to drive down unemployment rates.
The Fair Work Commission is in the process of reviewing the minimum wage rate, which Labor wants to keep pace with the rate of inflation, currently at 5.1 per cent.
Labor campaign spokesperson Tony Burke said if there is not a change of government on Saturday he would not expect Australians to get a wage rise.
"The government wants to keep wages low. What we will do ... is at every turn where we're able, help with putting upward pressure on wages," he told reporters in Canberra.
Labor is due to release election policy costings on Thursday and shadow treasurer Jim Chalmers said the prime minister was not being honest about what they would show.
"If this government spent as much time on their own budget as they spend making up stories about ours, then maybe they would have something to show for the trillion dollars in debt they've racked up in their budget heaving with rorts and waste," he told AAP.
Dr Chalmers denied coalition claims that Labor's budget deficits would be $20 billion larger than the government's own forecasts and said proposed policies would grow the economy in the right way.
"The Australian people aren't focused on press conferences or the timing of costings release, they're focused on whether or not they can feed their kids ... whether they can earn enough to keep up," he told ABC radio.
Meanwhile, two new polls show the election race has tightened in the coalition's favour ahead of voting day on Saturday, although Labor is still ahead on a two-party preferred basis.
A Resolve Strategic poll conducted for Nine newspapers shows Labor leads by 51 per cent to 49 per cent, compared to 54-46 two weeks ago.
An Essential poll published by The Guardian on Wednesday found Labor was on 48 per cent compared to 46 per cent for the coalition, against 49-45 a fortnight ago, with the remainder of voters undecided.
"Anything's possible on Saturday ... we don't get carried away when the polls are good, and we don't get carried away when the polls tighten a little bit," Dr Chalmers said.
Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese will speak at the National Press Club on Wednesday ahead of Saturday's election.
"Four more sleeps to go. Look, it's a daunting prospect the next four days, you can see the end of the journey," he told Nine News on Tuesday.
"But I've enjoyed the campaign and I'm comfortable we've left nothing on the field."
Mr Albanese is expected to face questions about the impact of Labor's election promises on the federal budget.
The government's costings total $2.3 billion and will be paid for by increasing the public service efficiency dividend to two per cent, from 1.5 per cent, which will raise about an extra $1 billion for a total of $2.7 billion.
