Sharp Drop in American Enthusiasm for Free Market, Poll Shows

[marmar]

via CommonDreams:




Published on Wednesday, April 6, 2011 by World Public Opinion.org
Sharp Drop in American Enthusiasm for Free Market, Poll Shows


American public support for the free market economy has dropped sharply in the past year, and is now lower than in China, according to a GlobeScan poll released today.



The findings, drawn from 12,884 interviews across 25 countries, show that there has been a sharp fall in the number of Americans who think that the free market economy is the best economic system for the future.

When GlobeScan began tracking views in 2002, four in five Americans (80%) saw the free market as the best economic system for the future--the highest level of support among tracking countries. Support started to fall away in the following years and recovered slightly after the financial crisis in 2007/8, but has plummeted since 2009, falling 15 points in a year so that fewer than three in five (59%) now see free market capitalism as the best system for the future.

GlobeScan Chairman Doug Miller commented: "America is the last place we would have expected to see such a sharp drop in trust in the free enterprise system. This is not good news for business." ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/04/06-8

[xchrom]

1. hmmmm. americans make no sense. nt

[Drale]

2. This is one area where America selfishness could help America

"The free market hasn't helped me, so why do we need it?" Thats how I've felt for years, only I've said "The free market hasn't helped America, so why do we need it?"

[socialist_n_TN]

5. It's also a PART of the rise in class consciousness

theme that permeating politics since the Great Recession started. When people start to question if free market economics helps or hurts me as an individual, they see that it actually HURTS them individually more than helps them. More and more are realizing who's side they SHOULD be on. And it ain't the free marketeers. Or to use an old fashioned word, the capitalists.

[Siouxmealso]

3. Compared to what?

The question is meaningless with most people in our society who can't even define democracy accurately.

[Cassandra]

4. Do you think a free market is worthwhile?

What does the term mean to you?

[louis-t]

9. Or "free market" for that matter.

[NC_Nurse]

6. We don't have a free market here anyway. We have socialism for the wealthy

and corporations and the freedom to be poor and destitute for the rest of us. Maybe more people are figuring that out.

How can we call our market "free" when we just bailed out the entire financial sector who deserved to go under?

[marmar]

7. True......

And all of these free marketeers seem to hate competition, e.g. a public health care option.

[BanzaiBonnie]

10. And a public option for broadband in NC

Telecom-Funded North Carolina House Votes To Gut Cheap And Fast Public Broadband

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=439&topic_id=801306

[Arkana]

11. I think the only place in the world with a more Randian paradise than us

is probably Somalia at this point.

[newspeak]

15. I'm with you!!!!

we don't have a free market. Mostly, what we have are global behemoth corporations who literally get away with murder. Most of them seem to be above any laws and if they poison the land or some people, most of the time they just move their business or get away with it with a monetary hand slap. They don't die--if they do too much damage, they can just change their name.

[Lance_Boyle]

8. In the US most respondents probably assumed 'free market' is a place

where you go to get stuff for free - it's like teh SOE-shu-LIZMs!

[QC]

12. K&R

[bvar22]

13. Oh Shit...THIS will make the The Invisible Hand very ANGRY.

Now we will be forced to sacrifice even MORE of the Working Class to appease her.


All HAIL the Invisible Hand!!!
The Giant Invisible Hand will save us ALL!

[kenny blankenship]

14. Suckers!

Too late now!

[upi402]

16. "Hey! What's that jabbing in my butt?"

DOH!

[Shandris]

17. This may well be easily explainable.

I was reading an article on the Times .world section about China due to some personal research right before logging on to DU today, and amongst the articles I saw posted and read was one wherein the Chinese author was talking about the importance of being able to strike, but even more important -- most important of all -- was the ability to collectively bargain. Naturally it was what caught my eye, given recent Rethuglican Governor actions. It was a very short article, didn't have a lot more to say really, but it got the morning thought processes working ('morning' for me, anyway :) ).

Chinese workers have seen the 'power' (for lack of a better term) of the Free Market system at work, and they believe it is only a matter of time until the fight for workers' rights is won. They've seen how the free market -- or rather, the portions of it that they currently have -- has already helped out their people and they are hungry for more of it. They don't have the experience with the downside of it that we do after several hundred years. They see only the benefits.

On the other hand, Americans have, as I said, had a few hundred years to see how the whole thing falls apart. The snake eating its' own tail, I always call it. We've seen how the power, expressed in financial terms and political representation will, over time, conglomerate into the hands of a few who will then try to take ~everything~ from the very workers who made it so successful for so long.

We're looking at the snake from opposite ends. We see the tail and realize where it goes (into the snake's mouth), they see that the snake is always eating something and thus will never hunger. As to what it is eating...they don't see how it matters yet.