While Barack Obama’s bleak poll numbers generally are attributed in large part to the economy, relatively few Americans think a Republican president would have done a better job, according to a new Washington Post-Bloomberg poll.
Twenty-three percent say the economy would be better if the GOP held the White House, 25 percent say it would be worse, and 45 percent say it would be the same. Similarly, 24 percent say they expect their family’s financial situation will improve if Obama is re-elected next year, 24 percent say they’ll be better off if a Republican wins in 2012, and 44 percent say it won’t make much difference.
The poll also found that 81 percent of Americans say the middle class will have to make sacrifices to cut the deficit–but on the whole, they’re rather see the rich pick up the tab.
Two-thirds of Americans–including more than half of those who identify themselves as Republican-leaning–say they’d support raising taxes on households with incomes over $250,000. Only 18 percent say they favor raising taxes on the middle class. And cutting entitlements that benefit the middle class is wildly unpopular, with 82 percent opposing cuts to Medicare and 83 percent against Social Security reductions.
(Telephone survey of 1,000 adults; MOE +/- 3.5 percentage points.)