ANALYSIS
by Glynn Wilson

Consumer confidence is on the rise in the United States, according to the latest Gallup poll on the subject, as President Barack Obama will deliver his State of the Union address to the nation on Tuesday night to deliver a strong economic message sympathetic to a middle class that feels squeezed by stagnant wages at a time of record corporate profits.

The President is expected to make the argument for higher taxes on the wealthy, to propose ways to make college more affordable, to offer new steps on tackling the housing crisis and outline ways to help bring back domestic manufacturing and expand hiring.

With unemployment on the way down and good news from the U.S. automobile industry and the retail sector after a successful holiday season, the general public perception is that the overall U.S. economy is getting better, according to Gallup.

“This seems like good news for the nation’s businesses as well as for U.S. economic confidence in the week ending Jan. 22, improved from the prior week and the best since the week ending May 22, 2011,” Gallup concludes in its analysis.

The Gallup Economic Confidence Index is an average of two components: Americans’ ratings of current economic conditions and their outlook for the economy.

“Americans have grown steadily more positive about current economic conditions in the past three weeks,” Gallup says. “They are also now more positive about the future direction of the economy than they were three weeks ago.”

Potential Pitfalls

There are still worries on the horizon this year that could impact both the confidence of Americans and the presidential election. Gas prices have increased since late December and the European economy appears to be entering into a recess. In addition, a standoff with Iran over the oil shipping lanes in the Straits of Hormuz could force gas prices even higher, although Saudi Arabia has stepped up production to counter any potential shortages.

Survey Methods

Results are based on telephone interviews conducted weekly as part of Gallup Daily tracking with a random sample of more than 2,000 adults aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia, selected using random-digit-dial sampling. For results based on the total sample of national adults, one can say with 95 percent confidence that the maximum margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3 percentage point.

Tags: Gallup Poll

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 24th, 2012 at 8:59 am and is filed under Business News, Elections 2012, Political News, Politics and Government, President Barack Obama, Public Opinion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.