Poll: Public Now Favors Bailout More Than They Oppose It
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in Economy, Legislation, PollsTrue, Rasmussen’s numbers still include a great deal who are undecided on the matter, but once they see this 777 point drop in the Dow today which wiped out ANY gains from Bush’s entire 8 years as President, I’m thinking they’re start to reconsider.
As Congress prepares to vote on a proposed economic rescue plan, opposition to the measure has declined significantly. A Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey conducted Sunday found that 33% of Likely Voters now favor the plan while 32% are opposed and 35% are not sure.For proponents of the legislation, that’s a significant improvement. On Friday, just 24% of voters had supported the plan while 50% were opposed.
And here’s the biggest data point…
Just 49% understand that the government anticipates recovering a significant portion of the $700 billion when the assets purchased are resold. Twenty-six percent (26%) say that’s not part of the plan while the rest are not sure.Those who understand that taxpayers will eventually get much of the money back support the bailout by a 2-to-1 margin. Those who incorrectly believe the government will not be getting money back oppose the bailout by a 62% to 18% margin.
So when people actually understand the terms of the bailout and realize that their money isn’t just being thrown down a big hole, they favor it. Imagine that.
That’s why I’m asking, respectfully, that if you’re a blogger and you’re not sure about the facts of the bailout…PLEASE don’t write about. This situation is too important for you to just throw around a bunch of uninformed opinions about the terms of the deal and muddy up the waters with a bunch of nonsense and misinformation.
This entry was posted on Monday, September 29th, 2008 and is filed under Economy, Legislation, Polls. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
September 29th, 2008 at 5:35 pm
Justin, I totally agree with you. If bloggers aren’t intimately knowledgeable about the crisis, they shouldn’t attempt to draw up solutions. I haven’t - instead I stuck with levity and conspiracy theories - and I hope responsible bloggers aren’t either.
Good post.
September 29th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
I’m not trying to be snarky, but I think it’s worth noting that, when you were using the high price tag of the plan to rail against the failures of the free market, you failed to note the difference between this investment and normal government spending:
As Paulson and others have tried explaining for the past week (and have not been helped by the media), much, if not all, of the price tag should be recouped, which means it is very different than healthcare or education spending. I agree that it is irresponsible for the media (mainstream and bloggers alike) to omit that important point.
September 30th, 2008 at 9:28 am
[...] I’d like to pull up two additional data points I shared from Rasmussen’s polling [...]