New Survey Finds US Public Wary Over Bush Tax Cuts

by Leroy Baker, Tax-News.com, New York

12 September 2001

According to a recent survey conducted by the Washington Post and ABC News, the majority of US citizens would be prepared to roll back the President's flagship tax cut in order to deal with the shrinking federal budget surplus.

During the poll, which took place by telephone between September 6 and 9, 57% of respondents said that they would be prepared to give back at least a portion of the tax cut, while 46% said that they would prefer that the government dropped proposed increases in military spending.

However, participants of all political stripes were united in their condemnation of the possibility that the government may dip into the social security pot, despite having promised earlier this year not to do so. An amazing 92% of those surveyed said that they opposed the measure, with 81% saying that they are strongly opposed, which ABC called 'a rare level of concentrated opposition'.

Despite the fact that the stated intention of the tax rebate scheme was to stimulate the economy and bring America out of its economic funk, six in ten of those surveyed said that they do not believe that it has had any discernable impact on the economy. In July, according to ABC, 37% of Americans thought that the tax cut would be a good thing, a figure which has now dropped to just 18%.

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