A new survey from The Economist/You Gov showing that 50 percent of Americans would vote for a democratic socialist has received ample media coverage, typically under headlines like this at The Hill: “Half of American voters say they would cast their ballot for a democratic socialist.”
But that is misleading, at best.
The poll, conducted just a few days before the midterm elections, asked 92 questions in total about a wide range of topics.
Question 20 asked, “Would you ever vote for a candidate who is a Democratic Socialist?” The response was 50 percent “Yes,” 41 percent “No,” and 9 percent “Not sure.”
Question 19, however, yielded an outcome that undermines the hype produced by Question 20.
Question 19 asked, “Who would you vote for if these were the candidates?” “A Democratic Socialist who is in favor of raising taxes on billionaires, Medicare-for-all, and abolishing ICE” or “A moderate Republican who is in favor of cutting spending and reducing the budget deficit.”
More than half chose the latter. Specifically, 52 percent wanted spending cuts whereas only 48 percent wanted more spending.
Question 5 also shows that most Americans have not completely fallen for the democratic socialist “free” stuff slogan.
When asked succinctly, “Which is the better economic system?” 51 percent said “Capitalism” compared to only 20 percent who said “Socialism.” Amazingly, 29 percent of Americans are on the fence, but capitalism still leads by a mile.
However, Question 43’s responses align more with the frightening headlines.
When asked, “Do you think the federal government should increase or decrease what it spends on Social Security, SNAP, Medicare, and Medicaid?” the faraway winner was “Increase a lot.”
On Social Security, 45 percent want to increase a lot, 24 percent increase slightly, 18 percent keep the same, 2 percent decrease slightly, 3 percent decrease a lot, and 7 percent unsure.
The distributional results for SNAP, Medicare, and Medicaid are very similar.
So, on one hand, according to this timely survey, half of Americans want democratic socialism, and vast majorities want more spending on federal redistribution programs. But on the other hand, at the same time, most of these same people think capitalism is far superior to socialism, and most would vote for a candidate who would cut spending and reduce the budget deficit.
This cognitive dissonance can be interpreted and analyzed in many ways.
First published at the Washington Examiner.
Chris Talgo is the Editorial Director for The Heartland Institute and a fellow for Heartland’s Glenn C. Haskins Emerging Issues Center.
