USA Today, Gallup Can't Read Their Own Social Security Poll

A new USA Today/Gallup poll finds the most Americans do not support broad cuts in Social Security, either by raising the retirement age or the payroll tax.

Oddly, that news is buried in the second-to-last paragraph of the USA Today article of the poll, and is not even mentioned in the Gallup.com write-up.

Instead, the USA Today headline reads "Poll: Faith in Social Security system tanking." Gallup.com's is similar: "Six in 10 Workers Hold No Hope of Receiving Social Security."

The implication, directly fed in both articles, is that the public is prepared to accept drastic changes to Social Security.

The USA Today piece leans on a prominent deficit hysteric to write:

Well-informed or not, public attitudes could affect the debate over what to do about Social Security, a subject that is likely to be raised when President Obama's deficit commission delivers its report in December.

"It makes it easier to make some of the changes that we are inevitably going to have to make," says Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. "We could make changes and still have people collecting more in benefits than they're expecting to see."

Similarly, Gallup.com's Frank Newport argues:

Younger Americans are most pessimistic, which could suggest somewhat paradoxically that if policymakers reduce Social Security benefits in the long run, Americans will not be as angry as might be thought, given their low expectations.

But all those poll numbers tell us is people are worried about deep Social Security cuts, not that they support deep Social Security cuts.

Further, the poll shows support for the sort of mild tweak that is all that is needed to strengthen Social Security over the long-run. As USA Today did get around to mentioning, "imposing the payroll tax on all the wages of higher-income workers" is one of the only proposed reforms that "command[s] majority support."

That's the actual news from this poll. The fact that the USA Today and Gallup buried such news is part of the reason why we continually get poll numbers that show how worried people are about receiving Social Security benefits.

Originally posted at OurFuture.org

 

 

 

Follow Bill Scher on Twitter: www.twitter.com/billscher

Comments

[padrushka]

05:02 AM on 07/23/2010

it is refreshing to be out of daily media brainwashing. when i see headlines such as this i wonder who cares and who reads. it is very difficult to find unbiased substantive information on subjects we need to have information about.

[Kai-HK]

09:02 PM on 07/22/2010

In my opinion I think young people are not expecting to get Soc Sec benefits becuase they inately understand the economics of it. Basically, Soc Sec has turned into a large publically run Ponzi scheme, in which money that people are paying in today are used to pay benefits for those today, not to invest for their payee's retirement in the future. As a result there is a huge unfunded obligation attached to this program. Unfortuantely the number of people retiring and improved life expectencies are compounding to the problem. As much as I like the idea, we gotta face economic reality: this program, along with medicare, etc, is slowly strangling this country. Three choices: 1) cut benefits 2) raise taxes (which reduce gdp growth and jobs) 3) take on more debt (dangerous at the levels we have now and could become a liability as was the case with Greece). Which direction do you want to go?

[Jerry Lammers]

04:18 PM on 07/22/2010

One way to 'save' Social Security is a massive tax on the media. Entertainment, cell phone applications, sports broadcasting, etc. are some of the greatest wealth concentrators of our times. Think what it would be like if national network commentators made say $100,000 per year instead of Millions. What if athletes lived in middle class neighborhoods? What if the Hollywood stars only made a few $100,000's per show? We can completely change the political, economic and cultural landscape with a big tax (say half of all revenue) on the media. This is one step in taking our country back from the talking heads (whether, they be Republican or Democrat, Libertarian, Socialist, Fascist, or Communist).

[GeorgeBurnsWasRight]

03:27 PM on 07/22/2010

For at least 50 years many people have been doubting that they will receive Social Security benefits when they retire, so this poll isn't news. I remember people saying this when I was a kid, and they were wrong. Oh, and we were also supposed to have run out of food and most of the world would be starving years ago.

Better headline: "Polls Show Future Very Difficult to Predict".

[tompoe]

11:10 AM on 07/22/2010

I wouldn't buy USAToday to line my kitty litter basket.

[padrushka]

05:03 AM on 07/23/2010

probably why it is always free in hotels

[noaxe397]

03:53 PM on 07/21/2010

Social Security is finished. When even left leaning commentators allow to go unchallenged defecit commission chairmen Bowles and Simpson's repeated recitations of RNC talking points that all federal tax revenue goes to paying social security, medicare and medicaid, then the dream has died, with all respect to the late Ted Kennedy.

[GHarry]

02:33 PM on 07/21/2010

It's increasingly obvious that the real goal of many Social Security deficit critics is to change public sentiments about not only that program but all government safety nets. Wall Street desperately wants to get its soiled hands on all pensions, especially Social Security benefits, so it was very predictable that the drumbeat from the establishment media would be all about the looming debt crisis being generated by social programs. They carefully avoid mentioning the trillions we spend on unnecessary wars, needless defense spending, outrageous subsidies of many industries and other wasteful pursuits. Social Security's problems could be virtually eliminated merely by removing the ridiculous cap on the amount of income that's subject to SS taxation, but that's also never mentioned -- at least in the breathless warnings about looming disaster. Surprise, surprise.

P.S. Judging by their dithering in the Elizabeth Warren hiring controversy, it's also increasingly obvious that the Obama White House is still taking its marching orders from Wall Street. Again, surprise, surprise.

[Computer Geek]

01:52 PM on 07/21/2010

Both of these people should be asked if they've stopped beating their spouses. Perhaps if we ask and keep asking these spin whores this question, they might get the idea that a lot of people are now questioning the way in which they spin the outcome of a poll to whatever they think it means, not what it really means. If I was young today, I would also be pessimistic that I would ever see any social security, given that all these spin whores keep trying to make sure it goes away!

[aceshigh]

11:57 AM on 07/21/2010

Don't you just love this qualifier in the USA Today article:

"Well-informed or not..."

WELL-INFORMED OR NOT?? NO! YOU, AS A NEWS OUTLET, ARE SUPPOSED TO INFORM THE AMERICAN PEOPLE! TELL US WHETHER IT'S TRUE OR NOT. IT'S CALLED FACT-CHECKING.

The right-wing has so poisoned the well with respect to the media in this country that people don't even trust facts when they're plainly presented in front of their faces.

No, it can't be a provable fact...it's just "liberal media bias"!

The systematic and intentional "dumbing-down" of the populace is going to end this country.

[SisterAnn]

08:51 AM on 07/21/2010

Many of our news sources have became a twenty four hour advertisement for Wall Street and the republican party.

[Carolyn LeBeauf]

02:49 AM on 07/21/2010

This is one reason we will not for long be seeing the soc call printed press. Lies, scare tactic and fearmongering is all the printed press engage in. Thank GOD for the internet.

[thebigbike]

05:04 PM on 07/20/2010

Mark Twain would revise his comment about there being "Iies, Damn Lies ,and statistics" to add at the end, the nadir of the string.... "polls" Lies Dam lies, statistics and way at the bottom, polls"

[Estreet1964]

01:47 PM on 07/20/2010

Just another example of why corporate media can't be trusted.

No wonder we keep getting policies that favor and increase corporate power while middle class Americans get screwed.

[TwoSpirits]

01:00 PM on 07/20/2010

And people wonder why I have no real faith in polls. The data is too easily skewed to support whatever ones position is....

[noaxe397]

03:56 PM on 07/21/2010

And imagine if it was Rasmussen, which extrapolates conclusions based on answers to its questions and calls that a poll.