WASHINGTON — Seventy-one percent of Americans want things to change and 70 percent want them to stay exactly the same, according to a survey released Wednesday by Halberd & Rowe Public Opinion, which said the results reflect “a deep and durable consensus in both directions.”
The survey of 2,406 adults, conducted by phone and online over nine days, asked respondents two questions: whether they would like things to be different, and whether they would like things to stay the way they are. Of those surveyed, 71.0 percent answered yes to the first question and 70.0 percent answered yes to the second. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.0 percentage points. The Reporter notes that this margin does not account for the remaining 41.0 percentage points, and that the Reporter’s own review of the data, conducted by this editor, carries a margin of error of plus or minus 0.3 editors.
“People want change. They also want it to be the same. These are not in tension. They’re in agreement,” said Nadine Corwell, 52, senior methodologist at Halberd & Rowe. “Most of them want a change that leaves everything where it is. It’s the most popular kind of change there is.”
Corwell said the 141.0 percent total was not the result of respondents answering yes to both questions, which only 0.4 percent did. An internal audit traced the surplus to 1,003 respondents, or 41.7 percent of the sample, who answered each question twice: once as themselves, and once as the person they said they would be “if things changed.” In 96.2 percent of cases, the changed version of the respondent wanted things to stay the same, and the original version wanted the changed version to change back. Halberd & Rowe weighted both versions to reflect the general population, which the firm said has grown 41.0 percent since the field period began, all of it on the second half of the questionnaire.
Subgroup results were similarly firm. Of respondents who want change, 64.2 percent want it “soon, but not right now,” and 22.9 percent want things to change “back,” a group the firm counted in both columns. Respondents who want things to stay the same were asked to specify which things. Of those, 88.1 percent said “everything,” and 79.3 percent of that group added “except the stuff that’s different now,” before declining to say what that was.
Dr. Marjorie Teller, director of the Center for Measured Outcomes, said the figures were consistent with the Center’s own long-term tracking. “Desire for change and desire for things to stay the same have each held at about 70 percent since 1994,” Teller said. “The fact that neither has moved in 32 years is the only thing in the data that respondents agree should change, and 70.6 percent of them would prefer that it didn’t.” The Center has applied for $2.8 million to locate the extra 41 percent, which Teller described as “out there somewhere, wanting things.”
The questionnaire closed with an open-ended item asking respondents to describe, in their own words, the kind of change they want. The most common answer, given by 31.7 percent, was “a different version of this.” The second most common, at 31.6 percent, was “this, but again.”
Halberd & Rowe said it will release a follow-up survey next month on whether the public would like the poll to be repeated. Preliminary results show that 71 percent would like a new poll and 70 percent would like it to be this one.