These are the topline results of a YouGov/Economist survey of 1000 US adults interviewed September 7 - 9, 2013 on the state of the American economy. The results show that Americans are still pessimistic about the state of the economy even as unemployment falls and think that the President should be doing more to create jobs. The margin of error is 4%.
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Do you think President Barack Obama is doing enough to create new jobs for Americans or should he do more?
Doing enough . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19%
Should do more . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .65%
Not sure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16%
Looking ahead, which would you say is more likely, that in the country as a whole we’ll have continuous good times during THE NEXT FIVE YEARS or so, or that we will have periods of widespread unemployment or depression, or what?
Good times . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4%
Mostly good times . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13%
Mixture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48%
Mostly bad times . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13%
Bad times . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12%
Not sure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10%
Looking ahead, which would you say is more likely, that in the country as a whole unemployment rates will continue to decrease during THE NEXT TWO YEARS or so, or that unemployment rates will start to increase again, or what?
Unemployment rates will decrease and two years from now will be a lot lower
than they are today . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9%
Unemployment rates will go up and down, and two years from now will be
somewhat lower than they are today . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19%
Unemployment rates will go up and down, but two years from now will be
about the same as they are today . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22%
Unemployment rates will go up and down, and two years from now will be
somewhat higher than they are today . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17%
Unemployment rates will increase and two years from now will be a lot higher
than they are today . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21%
Not sure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11%
Six months from now, do you think there will be...
More jobs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18%
The same amount of jobs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44%
Fewer jobs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28%
Not sure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10%