Category: Public opinion

And yet more climate change polling

~ Andrew Norton ~ 32 Comments

The climate change polls are flowing almost as quickly as predictions of impending climate doom, with two more out today.

In the Newspoll survey reported in The Australian, confirmation of previous research showing that the overwhelming majority (84%) of people believe that climate change is occurring. Of these people, only 3% believe that it is not caused by human activity.

And further exploration of the issue of whether Australia should stall an emissions trading scheme until the major polluters agree to cut back, or proceed with Labor’s 2010 plan. Last week in the ACNielsen survey 19% wanted to wait, with Newspoll this week finding 23% support for that position (as is usual for this subject, some big age differences with the 18-34 group much stronger on the issue than the 50+).

The Climate Institute has only a partial report of their survey, which asked what the federal opposition should do, with the three options being start a carbon emissions trading scheme in 2010, start before 2010, and start in 2012 or later.

The results are confusingly presented, with the press release stating both that 69% of Australians support the on or before 2010 options, and that 80% support the federal governemnt’s policy, even though there wasn’t obviously a question directly asking that. The latter is more consistent with the other polling, however.

Unfortunately, none of the pollsters have yet explored whether voters understand that Australia reducing emissions would make a very minor difference in itself, and won’t save the barrier reef or the Murray River or any of the other justifications commonly given.

Spreading ignorance of a carbon emissions trading scheme

~ Andrew Norton ~ 3 Comments

After three weeks of nearly non-stop discussion of a carbon emissions trading scheme public knowledge of it is…decreasing! On 1 July, The Age reported that half those surveyed by a Galaxy Poll had either not heard of an emissions trading scheme or did not know what it was. Today another Age report, this time of an ACNielsen poll, finds ignorance at 60% (I think the inclusion of a ‘slightly’ understand option pushed up those willing to confess to being baffled by the biggest reform in a decade).

Overall, there is a similar pattern here to other polling, which shows that most people are, at least in principle, willing to pay more to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The only question in this poll to yield new and interesting information was on whether Australia should act regardless of what other countries do. A surprisingly high number – 77% – say yes, with 19% saying we should reduce greenhouse gas emissions only if other nations do. I’d like to see more polling that investigates whether people believe that Australia acting alone will have much of an effect or not. With most respondents admitting to at best sketchy knowledge, it is hard to know what factual assumptions are behind the answers they are giving.

Are the politics of climate change easier or harder than the politics of economic reform?

~ Andrew Norton ~ 20 Comments

On the Sunday programme yesterday (about 6 minutes in), Laurie Oakes asked Ross Garnaut whether it was politically possible to implement the radical reforms needed to reduce carbon emissions.

In his reply Garnaut drew an analogy with trade liberalisation – a reform in which he played a distinguished part during the Hawke government. Public opinion has been consistently protectionist, Garnaut noted, yet politicians successfully implemented Australia’s transition from a highly protected to a largely open economy. They did so without major electoral consequences.

Garnaut argues that, politically speaking, we are starting well ahead of where we were with trade reform, since large majorities accept the need for change. Garnaut acknowledges the difficulties in moving from this generalised support for action to specific measures, but thinks it can be done.

The two issue starting points are, contrary to what Garnaut suggests, quite similar. The basic goal of the economic reform process – essentially to restore Australia’s economic prosperity – was a point of near-consensus, just as the need to do something about climate change is now. It was the means of getting there that generated controversy. Protection was a means, not an end, and we should not compare opinion on that with views on the goal of slowing or stopping climate change. In each reform case, we have a popular aim, but no easy way of getting there.
Continue reading “Are the politics of climate change easier or harder than the politics of economic reform?” →

Why is opinion on taxing and spending changing?

~ Andrew Norton ~ 12 Comments

This decade has shown the most favourable attitudes towards more government spending since the late 1960s. In a standard question on whether respondents would prefer reduced taxes or more spending on social services, the proportion saying reduced taxes dropped from 57% in 1996 to 34% in 2007. Support for the more spending option increased from 17% support in 1996 to 47% in 2007. (The numbers from 1993 onwards can be seen at p.29 of this compilation of Australian Election Survey results (pdf)).

But why has opinion changed? The Age this morning reports one theory:

Ian McAllister, who has been one of the principal investigators for the ANU study since 1987 and is a professor of political science at the university, says the changing mood reflects greater support for collectivist solutions to social and economic problems.

This is due in some part to a growing cynicism towards privatisation, a view that it has gone too far, or at least far enough…. Then there’s the jump in private school fees and the cost of higher education, and the rise of private health insurance, which almost half the population now has. Juxtapose this with reports of public hospital waiting lists growing and some schools across the country needing major renovations.

Though I am the exception among the handful of public opinion researchers looking at this data, I don’t think this explains what is going on. The AES itself has results which are inconsistent with an ideological shift being a major factor. For this to drive support for more social spending nearly tripling in a decade, we would expect to see a significant leftward shift in the AES question which asks respondents to place themselves on a numbered left (0) to right (10) scale. There is leftward movement, but not by much: from on average 5.46 in 1996 to 5.29 in 2007. The electorate is stable in the political centre, but has substantially changed its opinion on taxing and spending. Continue reading “Why is opinion on taxing and spending changing?” →

The real greenhouse denialists, part 3

~ Andrew Norton ~ 10 Comments

George Megalogenis was in an optimistic mood when he wrote this analysis piece on Newspoll’s carbon emissions trading scheme survey. According to George:

VOTERS want to be led on the issue of climate change, and if leadership means higher prices at the bowser, so be it. …

A strong majority of voters (61 per cent) say a carbon emissions trading scheme could help slow global warming. Almost as many again (56 per cent) are prepared to pay more for energy sources such as petrol, electricity and gas under an ETS.

But another poll, also reported today but in The Age, found that half the population had either never heard of emissions trading or did not know what it was. Only 7% claimed to know a lot about it. This did not, however, stop 72% of voters telling Essential Media Communications (a left-wing PR and polling firm) that they supported a carbon emissions trading scheme.
Continue reading “The real greenhouse denialists, part 3” →

The views of Liberal defectors

~ Andrew Norton ~ Leave a comment

The SMH had a report yesterday on the results of the 2007 Australian Election Survey. It comes up with the following unsurprising findings:

? Industrial relations and global warming were the biggest vote-changing issues.

? Rising interest rates did not cost the Coalition as dearly as thought.

? Voters respected Mr Howard but were virtually in love with Mr Rudd, giving him the highest “likeability” rating in the survey’s 20-year history.

? Low-income battlers moved decisively back to Labor.

? The Coalition would have struggled under Mr Costello.

But the article doesn’t make use of a useful question in the AES, on which party the respondent voted for in 2004 (with a caveat, of course, on the reliability of 2004 memories). This question can be used to sort the views of people who defected to Labor in 2007 from those who were Labor voters anyway.

When we compare people who switched from Liberal to Labor between 2004 and 2007 with those who remained with the Liberals we can see that the former group was more anti-WorkChoices. Of the 19% of 2004 Liberal voters who voted Labor in 2007, 80% disapproved of WorkChoices. Only 23% of those who stayed with the Liberals disapproved of WorkChoices.
Continue reading “The views of Liberal defectors” →

Self-interest and the Budget

~ Andrew Norton ~ 4 Comments

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.

The public warms to tax cuts

~ Andrew Norton ~ 5 Comments

The odd desire of Australian voters to fight inflation with their tax dollars might be coming to an end.

A poll reported this morning in the News Ltd tabloids found, for the first time in recent polling, more for respondents for the tax cuts than against even after they had been alerted to the possible interest rate consequences.

The Galaxy Poll question read:

Do you think the government was right or wrong to introduce tax cuts, given the risk they may pose to inflation and interest rates on home loans?

49% thought it was right, and 31% said it was wrong. Only last week, The Australian reported a Newspoll that found 53% against the tax cut when told that it might increase interest rates.

The poll also asked a budget better off/worse off question. 23% say they will be better off, which is likely to under-state the real figure, and 33% say they will be worse off, which is unlikely unless they are very heavy alocopop drinkers, a luxury car buyer, or a pensioner about to be hit with hefty private health insurance fund premium increases.

There is a pattern of budget benefits being understated and losses overstated. Even with last year’s budget, which so far as I could tell had no losers beyond new commerce students paying higher HECS, Newspoll managed to find 14% of people who thought that they were worse off, and only 36% who thought that they would be better off.

These polls read the politics of the budget more than its reality. But with pensioner protests in the streets, Labor may now start to realise that by relentlessly droning on about ‘working families’ other households may start to feel like losers. Continue reading “The public warms to tax cuts” →

First signs that familism has limits?

~ Andrew Norton ~ 13 Comments

The previous government was extraordinarily generous to families.  According to calculations I did from Treasury’s Intergenerational Reports, the FTBs alone increased, in per person terms, 29% per person between the 2002 and 2007 reports. And that’s not counting the baby bonus or childcare handouts.

Yet according to the 2007 Australian Election Survey, only 41% of respondents thought that the Howard government had become more generous over the last 10 years to ‘working couples with children’. 23% of Australians, who must have been holidaying on another planet during the Howard era, even thought that they had become ‘tougher’ on these working families.

But in this familist time, is there any end to the demands of ‘working families’? According to the AES, 49.5% of respondents agree that ‘working couples with children’ deserve more or much more from the social welfare system. My answer, that they deserve ‘much less’, is supported by a miserable 0.8% of respondents. Even the answer that they deserve ‘less’ support has only 4.5% support. And I thought I had a tough task selling higher education reform.

But some hope comes from this morning’s Newspoll reported in The Australian. About two-thirds majorities support means testing the baby bonus and FTB B, and 57% support means testing childcare tax rebates. And there is majority support for the testing to begin at $70,000 a year, which if based on household income would start to make some serious savings.

Of course I think these savings should be directed to tax cuts, which would in part benefit those same families. Yet this Newspoll, like other recent polling on the subject, finds that support for tax cuts drops (in this case from 66% to 36%) if respondents are told that tax cuts might cause interest rates to increase. But tax cuts financed from reduced family spending ought to be neutral for interest rates, since the total amount ending up in consumers’ pockets will be the same.

Gambling with issue strengths

~ Andrew Norton ~ 22 Comments

As various opinion pieces have pointed out this week, the Liberals are playing high-stakes politics with their budget strategy.

They are going against the conventional wisdom that spending cuts are necessary to avoid future interest rate increases, and instead saying that there is a danger the economy could slow too much. Intellectually, I think this is a defensible position. The budget is a very clunky mechanism for macroeconomic fine-tuning, with its measures unlikely to have any significant effects for months and hard to change if they prove to be misjudgments.

Politically, however, the argument is too complex and risks further undermining the historic issue strengths of the Liberals.

The recently released results from the 2007 Australian Election Survey (a mail-out survey, which closed in March 2008) shows that while more respondents prefer the Liberals than Labor on interest rates, the margin has narrowed significantly since 2004. The 29 percentage point lead the Liberals had after the 2004 election had shrunk to 6 percentage points after the 2007 election. By not being seen to be strong on the interest rate question this is put further at risk.
Continue reading “Gambling with issue strengths” →