Pew: For Every 10 Americans, Only 3 Trust the Government

The Pew Research Center in Washington, D.C. has found that fewer Americans than ever trust the decisions made by the government.

Data collected from a survey taken in January of this year indicates that all demographics and partisan groups experienced an increasing lack of faith in government leadership, according to a release posted on the Pew Research website late last week.

“However, there are disparities,” the official summary noted. “[M]ore than twice as many Hispanics as whites (44 percent vs. 20 percent) trust the federal government, and more blacks (38 percent) than whites trust the government.”

Researchers additionally observed that younger Americans trust the government more than their older counterparts, and that more liberals believe in the administration of President Barack Obama than either independents or Republicans.

Conversely, distrust of federal government is presently at 73 percent. Earlier on in the Obama administration, it reportedly hit a record high of 80 percent, according to a graph constructed and presented by researchers at Pew. {snip}

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According to Pew, almost 60 percent of people in the United States had confidence in the federal government before President Bill Clinton left office. When Bush left, national trust was down to about 25 percent of the nation’s people.

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