A small postcript to my post on self-interest and public opinion. All three polls on the Budget – Galaxy yesterday, and ACNielsen and Newspoll today, find very similar proportions of people saying the Budget will make them worse off (33%/30%/32%) or make no difference/uncommitted (44%/39%/39%).

However, ACNielsen finds 61% of people declaring themselves satisfied with the Budget and 57% saying it was ‘fair’. At least some voters who don’t think they will get anything from the Budget or perhaps even think they will be worse off are nevertheless not unhappy with it.