AEI political report: My town, the nation

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How strong are America’s communities? This issue of AEI’s Political Report explores people’s views about where they live. A recent poll in the Heartland Monitor series by Allstate and National Journal provided the entry point into our assessment. We examine many aspects of local life, including people’s satisfaction with their communities and how they rate their local areas. In view of the 80th anniversary of the Social Security Act’s enactment, this issue also looks at public opinion on the program.

Your Local Area

• Community versus country: A majority (60 percent) of Americans say they are satisfied with the way things are going in their local community, while only 25 percent say they are satisfied with the way things are going in this country (Pew and Gallup). Other data in this report show that people see more progress in local solutions to problems than federal ones and that young people trust local and state government slightly more than national government (Allstate/National Journal and Harvard Institute of Politics).
• Are you a “local”? A trend from the National Opinion Research Center shows that most Americans live in the same state as they did when they were age 16. Forty-two percent would advise young people to settle down in their local area for the best future opportunities; 44 percent would recommend a different part of the country (Allstate/National Journal).
• Rating your local area: Seventy-six percent say it is very important for their local area to be a place where all people have equal opportunity to get ahead, making that the quality people identify as wanting the most in their community (Allstate/National Journal). Nearly 70 percent rate the quality of life in their local area as excellent or good (Allstate/National Journal).

Social Security

• Is it viable? In 1936, 60 percent said they favored Social Security while 27 percent opposed it (Gallup). Nearly 50 years later, in 1983, 47 percent said Congress’s changes to the law would not solve Social Security’s financial troubles, 10 percent said they would, and 43 percent were not sure (Cambridge Reports). Today, 63 percent of nonretired adults do not expect Social Security will have the money to pay them benefits they expect when they retire (CBS News/New York Times). Still, 36 percent of nonretired adults expect Social Security to be a major source of income when they retire, the highest response since Gallup first asked the question in 2001 (Gallup).

• American exceptionalism: Americans think differently from people in other Western countries about who should provide for the elderly. Fifty-eight percent in Italy and 48 percent in Germany said the government should bear the greatest responsibility for people’s economic well-being in their old age; only 24 percent in the United States gave that response (Pew).