When given a choice about how government should address the numerous economic difficulties facing today's consumer, Americans overwhelmingly -- by 84% to 13% -- prefer that the government focus on improving overall economic conditions and the jobs situation in the United States as opposed to taking steps to distribute wealth more evenly among Americans. . . .
| B.O.'s still gonna win the election, because he gives people "hope." Then he's gonna "share the wealth." You "share the wealth" by taking from the rich and giving to the poor. The route to the poor lies through friends of B.O., who will receive lucrative contracts to "organize" the poor. The poor end up receiving the redistributed wealth not in cash but in "services," which involve large numbers of people holding slips of paper with numbers on them sitting around rooms furnished with plastic chairs in unimaginatively designed concrete buildings awaiting the attention of bureacrats, some few of whom will attempt to elicit sexual favors before proviving a referral to some other bureaucrat. |
Americans' lack of support for redistributing wealth to fix the economy spans political parties: Republicans (by 90% to 9%) prefer that the government focus on improving the economy, as do independents (by 85% to 13%) and Democrats (by 77% to 19%). This sentiment also extends across income groups: upper-income Americans prefer that the government focus on improving the economy and jobs by 88% to 10%, concurring with middle-income (83% to 16%) and lower-income (78% to 17%) Americans. . . .
A separate question finds Americans more likely to believe government is doing too many things that should be left to individuals and businesses (50%) as opposed to saying government should do more to solve the country's problems (43%). This broad question is not directed specifically at the economy, but reinforces the general idea that many Americans are leery of too much direct government intervention in fixing the country's problems.
This philosophical issue appears to divide Americans by both political party and income groups. Republicans think the government is currently doing too much, by 72% to 24%; independents are split, with 47% saying the government is doing too much and 44% saying it is not doing enough; and Democrats say the government needs to do more by 58% to 36%. . . .
With Barack Obama suggesting a variety of tax increases for upper-income Americans and John McCain opposing them, one might assume that Americans' minimal support for government getting into wealth redistribution to help the economy would favor McCain. Although the margins are much smaller when it comes to the idea that government is doing too much as opposed to too little to solve the country's problems, this issue would also seem to favor McCain. . . . |