Poll: American Pessimism About Past, Future Rises to Historic Levels
Ricky Kreitner, Business Insider, June 30, 2011
Americans are overwhelmingly pessimistic about their own future and about the fate of their country, according to a new Time/Penn Shoen Berland poll presented at this week’s Aspen Ideas Festival.
Sixty-eight percent of Americans think the last decade showed a marked decline in American life. Most applicants do not expect things to improve in the near future.
Largely due to the election of Barack Obama, minorities are an exception to this overwhelmingly pessimistic trend.
Whites tend to view the last decade as one of the worst of the last century. African-Americans and Hispanics are more likely than others to say that the quality of life in America has improved.
[Editor’s Note: Click through to the original article to see a number of interesting charts and statistics.]