The General Social Survey had a question of the form:
Listed below are various areas of government spending. Please indicate whether you would like to see more or less government spending in each area. Remember that if you say “much more,” it might require a tax increase to pay for it. b. Health
I’ve broken down responses by demographic variables below. The rows add up to 100%.
| Spend….
| ||||||
| Much More | More | Same | Less | Much Less | ||
| Age | 18-30 | 41.7 | 45.6 | 8.6 | 2.4 | 1.7 |
| 31-45 | 33.4 | 44.8 | 15.7 | 5.1 | 1 | |
| 46-65 | 36.9 | 43.7 | 13.1 | 4.7 | 1.6 | |
| 66+ | 31.6 | 43.8 | 18.2 | 6.1 | 0.3 | |
| Sex | Male | 33.9 | 45.5 | 13.5 | 5.2 | 1.9 |
| Female | 38.1 | 43.4 | 13.6 | 4.1 | 0.8 | |
| Ideology | Liberal | 47.7 | 39.4 | 9.9 | 2.4 | 0.6 |
| Moderate | 37.9 | 47.1 | 11.9 | 2.1 | 1 | |
| Conserv. | 25.2 | 44.8 | 18.9 | 9 | 2.1 | |
| Party | Democrat | 46.1 | 42.3 | 8.6 | 2.4 | 0.8 |
| Independent | 36.8 | 47.6 | 13 | 1.8 | 0.8 | |
| Republican | 22.4 | 45.3 | 20.5 | 9.6 | 2.2 | |
| Socioecon. Index | SEI 17-50 | 36.9 | 46.1 | 11.6 | 4.7 | 0.8 |
| SEI 50-100 | 34.2 | 42.2 | 17.3 | 4.9 | 1.4 | |
| Race | White | 31.6 | 45.8 | 15.5 | 5.5 | 1.6 |
| Black | 54.7 | 38.7 | 4.2 | 1.5 | 0.9 | |
| Region | Northeast | 47.2 | 34.9 | 11.2 | 3.5 | 3.1 |
| Midwest | 31.6 | 49 | 14.1 | 4.1 | 1.1 | |
| South | 34.4 | 46.3 | 13.7 | 4.6 | 1 | |
| West | 35.7 | 43.1 | 14.6 | 5.9 | 0.6 | |
| Education | < High School | 40.4 | 42 | 10.6 | 5.4 | 1.6 |
| High School | 39.8 | 42.4 | 13.5 | 3.3 | 1 | |
| Jun. College | 26.8 | 58 | 8.1 | 7.1 | 0 | |
| Bachelor | 26.3 | 47.3 | 18.7 | 6.5 | 1.2 | |
| Graduate | 29.4 | 45.5 | 15.7 | 6.2 | 3.2 | |
Secular Right needs to be more inclusive:
Hispanics
Much more 42.4
More 37.1
Same 15.6
Less 4.4
Much less 0.5
They vote like 18 years olds and earn like 18 year olds.
This and other information of late have convinced me of the futility of trying to convince the majority of Americans that freedom means freedom from government, and that in order for people to remain free they must be individually responsible. The worst perpetrators of this health care scam are the elderly, so called conservatives, who want their cake and eat it too. If you are a statist and want the government to provide health care, then decisions; such as, “death committees” are a necessity for rationing a limited resource and they make sense in this context. If you pay and contract for your health care then you decide. What a corrupted ideology has been infected into the American mind.
This and other information of late have convinced me of the futility of trying to convince the majority of Americans that freedom means freedom from government, and that in order for people to remain free they must be individually responsible.
why yes.
One way or another, it seems that oligarchy is the future.
It remains to be seen who the ruling class will turn out to be. Rather than trying to sway people to our side, we should instead be trying to ensure that our side is on top.
“Government spending.” Does that include government spending on defense, spying, plus international military commitment which lead to wars, more government intrusion on civil libertaies, etc..? I assume that “liberals” are opposed to that more than the “conservatives.” And, yes, it’s the other way around when it comes to government spending on domestic programs. So…after providing us with the polls’ results on attitudes re spending on health, please let us know about the attitudes regarding spending on the Pentagon, CIA, etc.
It’s amazing that Obama is running into trouble when 70% of “conservatives” and “Republicans” think the government should spend more on health.
@Anthony – That can be explained by racism.
Darn wordpress stips out my snark tags!
And what is the point of having a side that is “on top” if we’ve already allied ourselves with the enemy to do so? Your logic is contradictory.
Seems like hard-core libertarians are concentrated in the northeast and among people with graduate education.
Solid majorities of every demographic listed said “more” or “much more” even though the question was deliberately slanted against spending with the tax increase comment. (Bush’s wild spending was never accompanied by tax increases to pay for it, and in a recession, even liberals can justify having the spending increase now and the tax increase later.)
@Anthony: U.S. Senator isn’t one of the listed demographic groups. (Although I do tend to wonder why more U.S. Senators can’t read this chart – even in the South more government spending on healthcare polls at 80%!)
The thing I find weird is the educational brackets – they seem to contradict the usual “educated = liberal” correlation. Maybe the higher educational brackets expected themselves to be in the higher income brackets (either now or in the future) and so were unusually scared off “much more” by the tax hike comment?
Educated people are more liberal on social issues, but more conservative on economic ones.