Attitudes Toward Economy Improving, Says Survey

February 22, 2012 1:06 am

According to the latest Harris Poll online survey of 2,056 adults, the general feeling toward the economy and employment is gradually improving.

Over one-third of Americans (36 percent) say they expect the economy to improve in the coming year while two in five (40 percent) say it will remain the same and one-quarter (24 percent) believe it will get worse. These statistics are based on December survey results when one-quarter of U.S. adults (23 percent) believed the economy would improve, almost half (47 percent) felt it would stay the same and three in ten (29 percent) thought it would get worse.

Perceptions of the job market are also improving, albeit a little more slowly. Three in five Americans (59 percent) rate the current job market of their region of the country as bad, 16percent say it is good and one-quarter (25 percent) say it is neither good nor bad. In January, almost two-thirds of U.S. adults (65 percent) felt the job market in their region was bad and 14percent felt it was good. This is the first time since July of 2008 that the percentage of those who think the job market in their region is bad is below 60 percent.

Looking ahead, there is also a sense of optimism on where the job market is heading. One-third of Americans (32 percent) believe the job market in their region of the nation will get better in the next six months, half (51 percent) say it will stay the same and 17 percent believe it will get worse. Last month, just one-quarter (27 percent) felt the job market would get better, over half (53 percent) felt it would remain the same and one in five (21 percent) felt it would get worse.

Finally, feelings about whether the country is still in a recession or not are also improving. In September, seven in ten Americans (69 percent) felt the country was still in a recession, while one in ten each felt that the U.S. came out of a recession but will now enter a new recession (11 percent) and the country has come out of the recession and the economy is growing (10 percent). A few months later and, while over half of Americans (56percent) still think the country is in a recession, one-quarter (24 percent) believe the country has come out of the recession and the economy is growing and just 8 percent believe the U.S. has come out of a recession but will enter a new one.

Published with permission from RISMedia.


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