GALLUP: “Americans Hate Each Other”

Each summer the Gallup organization surveys Americans to gauge their confidence levels in 14 important societal institutions. In some of the categories, Gallup surveyed Republicans and Democrats separately and published their findings under the curious headline: “Americans Hate Each Other.”  Here are some of the most interesting highlights.

Over twice as many Republicans as Democrats trust the police. Twice as many Democrats as Republicans trust the public schools. Twice as many Republicans as Democrats trust organized religion. Twice as many Democrats as Republicans trust organized labor.

Gallup says the latest surveys show the country is as polarized as ever this year. Perhaps our widest polarization today remains over RACE; some 56% of white adults told the Gallup survey that they trusted the police, while only 27% of Black adults did.

“We are seeing levels of polarization that we are just not used to,” said Kenneth D. Wald, a University of Florida political scientist. The two political parties live in different worlds, and they inhabit different information networks. The Republicans live in Fox News, and they don’t trust newspapers. Democrats have different information sources and listen to MSNBC. The magnitude of all our divisions has increased because of the number of information sources.

Confidence in Most Institutions Down After Increases in 2020

In 2020, confidence in several specific institutions increased as the nation dealt with the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. These include some of the business and societal sectors most affected by the public health and financial effects of the coronavirus situation, including the medical system, public schools, small business, organized religion and banks.

This year, these same five institutions show the greatest decreases in confidence. However, they all are perceived at least slightly better than they were in 2019 before the pandemic. In particular, confidence in the medical system is substantially higher now (44%) than it was two years ago (36%).

Confidence in the US Supreme Court and the criminal justice system are each down four points since 2020 and remain below their 2019 levels. Meanwhile, decreases since last year in Americans’ confidence in eight other institutions are not statistically significant. These include the military, technology companies, organized labor, newspapers, television news, the presidency, big business and Congress.

In addition to big business, the police were the only other institution that saw a drop in confidence between 2019 and 2020. Since then, confidence in the police has edged up three points, to a slim 51% majority.

Last year’s confidence reading for the police, which was taken in the aftermath of George Floyd’s killing and the related nationwide protests, was the lowest on record and the first time it was below majority level. While the latest three-point uptick is not statistically significant, the measure remains shy of its 2019 level.

The police are one of just three institutions in which a majority of Americans express a great deal or quite a lot of confidence. The other two – small business and the military – have consistently ranked at the top of the list since 1989.

At the other end of the spectrum are Congress, television news, big business, the criminal justice system and newspapers, each of which has a confidence rating at or below 21%. Congress has ranked at the bottom of the list most years since 2007.

The other eight institutions earn middling confidence ratings from the public, ranging from 28% for organized labor to 44% for the medical system.

The largest partisan gap in confidence for any institution is for the presidency, with 49 points separating Democrats’ and Republicans’ ratings. Confidence in the presidency has become increasingly linked to the party affiliation of the president, with supporters of the president’s party much more confident than supporters of the opposition party, consistent with the greater party polarization in presidential job approval ratings. Between 1993 and 2004, the average party gap in confidence in the presidency was 34 points. Since then, it has averaged 50 points.

The Bottom Line (per Gallup): When the coronavirus pandemic hit the US in 2020, it caused great upheaval in most aspects of Americans’ lives. It also resulted in an overall uptick in average confidence across 14 institutions, driven largely by sharp one-year increases – among the largest Gallup has measured – for the US medical system and public schools.

Now, with the worst of the pandemic seemingly over and the intensity of the racial justice protests subsiding, Americans’ confidence has retreated to more typical levels seen in recent years.