By Gary Howard
When looking at this Rasmussen poll on American views of capitalism and socialism, I hoped that the percentage of those favoring capitalism over socialism would be much larger.
Sixty percent (60%) of U.S. adults nationwide say that capitalism is better than socialism. A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey finds that 18% disagree, while 21% are not sure.
Adults under 30 are closely divided on the question. While Republicans and unaffiliated voters overwhelmingly say that capitalism is better, just 43% of Democrats agree. Twenty-four percent (24%) of Democrats say socialism is better.
Seventy-six percent (76%) of investors favor capitalism, compared to only 45% of non-investors.
Last year at this time, among all adults, only 53% said capitalism was better. Continue reading…
A better idea of what this means would have come if they asked these folks how they define capitalism, but I guess this sort of answers that question [emphasis added]:
However, it’s important to note that just 35% believe a free market economy is the same as a capitalist economy. In fact, despite tepid support for capitalism, 77% of Americans prefer a free market economy rather than a government managed economy.That’s consistent with the 75% who say that business is better at customer service than government.
One reason for the gap in support for capitalism and free markets is clearly the behavior of some large American corporations. Seventy-three percent (73%) of Americans believe that Goldman Sachs is likely to have committed fraud as charged by the federal Securities and Exchange Commission. Seven-out-of-10 Americans believe that government and big business work together against the interests of consumers and investors. Continue reading…
And that is the best news to take from this poll, that most people see that it’s the collusion of big business and big government that causes most of our problems. Common sense seems to be alive and well, except inside the beltway.
People still need to be educated about what a true free market looks like, but at least there are a lot of people open to it.