(Press-News.org) In its 27th survey of American spending priorities since 1973 conducted as part of its General Social Survey (GSS), NORC at the University of Chicago Wednesday released a report on its most recent findings. By a notable margin, education and health care were the top two spending priorities of Americans. And Americans are consistent in that: those two categories have finished in the top two in each of the ten surveys since 1990.
The spending priorities report is derived from recently released data of the 2010 General Social Survey which NORC has conducted for forty years. The GSS is a biennial survey that gathers data on contemporary American society in order to monitor and explain trends and constants in attitudes, behaviors, and attributes. NORC makes the high-quality data easily accessible to scholars, students, policy makers, and others. Over 16,000 research uses in articles, textbooks, monographs, dissertations, etc. have been documented. The GSS is supported by the National Science Foundation and it is the second most-referenced survey in America after the U.S. Census.
Rounding out the top ten spending priorities were (3) assistance to the poor (4) halting crime, (5) Social Security, (6) the environment, (7) dealing with drug addiction, (8) childcare, (9) drug rehabilitation, and (10) law enforcement. Finishing lowest in priority, as it has in every survey since 1973, is foreign assistance. The study surveys public preferences on twenty-two spending categories.
The findings have additional significance in that they are derived from the first GSS to be conducted since the 2008 economic meltdown. Despite the poor economy and despite the pinch of taxes for a majority, (in 2010, 53% said their federal taxes were too high, 46% about right, and 2% too low) Americans back more spending in about three-quarters of the areas and less spending only in the bottom quarter.
However, the level of support for more spending declined from 2008 in most but not every category. For instance, the net percentage of people who felt we spend too little on law enforcement fell from 44.8% in 2008 to 36.4% in 2010; the net percentage of those who feel we spend too little on the environment fell from 58.7% in 2008 to 48.5% in 2010.
The survey employs a sample of 2,044 interviews. The order of spending priorities is determined by subtracting the percentage of respondents saying "too much" is being spent in a category from those saying that "too little" is being spent for that category. The resulting net percentage in each category determines their rank in the list of spending categories.
Tom W. Smith, the Director of the General Social Survey and Principal Investigator said, "Facing soaring deficits and disagreements over the mix of taxes and spending in the budget, it is valuable to consider what the American people think governmental spending priorities should be and how their preferences have changed over the last four decades."
###
A copy of the full report with comparative data dating back to 1973 can be obtained on the NORC web site.
About NORC at the University of Chicago
NORC at the University of Chicago is an independent research organization headquartered in downtown Chicago with additional offices on The University of Chicago's campus and in Washington, D.C. and Bethesda, Maryland. NORC also supports a nationwide field staff as well as international research operations. With clients throughout the world, NORC collaborates with government agencies, foundations, educational institutions, nonprofit organizations and businesses to provide the data and analysis that supports informed decision making in key areas including health, education, economics, crime, justice, energy, security, and the environment. NORC's 70 years of leadership and experience in data collection, analysis, and dissemination—coupled with deep subject matter expertise—provides the foundation for effective solutions.
New study shows government spending preferences of Americans
Spending Study is the 27th in a series since 1973 by NORC at the University of Chicago
2011-03-10
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
New molecular robot can be programmed to follow instructions
2011-03-10
Scientists have developed a programmable "molecular robot" — a sub-microscopic molecular machine made of synthetic DNA that moves between track locations separated by 6nm. The robot, a short strand of DNA, follows instructions programmed into a set of fuel molecules determining its destination, for example, to turn left or right at a junction in the track. The report, which represents a step toward futuristic nanomachines and nanofactories, appears in ACS's Nano Letters.
Andrew Turberfield and colleagues point out that other scientists have developed similar DNA-based ...
Battling the bedbug epidemic
2011-03-10
Mom's comforting tuck-them-in-words — "Sleep tight, don't let the bedbugs bite"— is becoming an impossible dream for millions of people as the world experiences a resurgence of an ancient scourge that is fostering human misery, financial burdens and the risk of exposure to potentially toxic materials. That's the message from the cover story of the current edition of Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), ACS' weekly newsmagazine.
In the article, C&EN News Editor William G. Schulz points out that bedbugs represent a growing epidemic that is difficult to control. The bugs ...
Pinpointing air pollution's effects on the heart
2011-03-10
Scientists are untangling how the tiniest pollution particles – which we take in with every breath we breathe – affect our health, making people more vulnerable to cardiovascular and respiratory problems. While scientists know that air pollution can aggravate heart problems, showing exactly how it does so has been challenging.
In a study published recently in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, scientists showed that in people with diabetes, breathing ultrafine particles can activate platelets, cells in the blood that normally reduce bleeding from a wound, ...
Study shows how plants sort and eliminate genes over millennia
2011-03-10
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Hybrid plants with multiple genome copies show evidence of preferential treatment of the genes from one ancient parent over the genes of the other parent, even to the point where some of the unfavored genes eventually are deleted.
Brian Dilkes, an assistant professor of genetics at Purdue University, worked with a team of scientists at the University of California Davis and University of Southern California to study the genome of Arabidopsis suecica, a hybrid species with four chromosome sets formed tens of thousands of years ago from a cross between ...
What's in a name? Broadening the biological lexicon to bolster translational research
2011-03-10
So-called model organisms have long been at the core of biomedical research, allowing scientists to study the ins and outs of human disorders in non-human subjects.
In the ideal, such models accurately recapitulate a human disorder so that, for example, the Parkinson's disease observed in a rat model would be virtually indistinguishable from that in a human patient. The reality, of course, is that rats aren't human, and few models actually faithfully reflect the phenotype of the disease in question. Thus, in the strictest sense of the word, many "models" aren't truly ...
Novel method could improve the performance of proteins used therapeutically
2011-03-10
FINDINGS: Whitehead Institute scientists have created a method that uses the enzyme sortase A to site-specifically modify proteins. Using this technique, researchers were able to increase potency, slow the metabolism, and improve thermal stability of several proteins, including interferon alpha 2 (IFN-alpha 2) and granulocyte colony-stimulating factor 3 (GCSF-3). IFN-alpha 2 is used to treat a variety of diseases, including leukemia, melanoma, and chronic hepatitis C, while GCSF-3 (known as filgrastim and marketed as Neupogen®) is administered to patients with neutropenia.
RELEVANCE: ...
First international index developed to predict suicidal behavior
2011-03-10
Although thousands of people commit suicide worldwide each year, researchers and doctors do not have any method for evaluating a person's likelihood of thinking about or trying to commit suicide. An international group of scientists, in which the Hospital del Mar Research Institute (IMIM) has participated, has devised the first risk index in order to prevent suicides.
"It is of key importance to identify suicidal thoughts among people at increased risk. The most important contribution that our study has made is an international risk index to estimate the likelihood of ...
More reasons to be nice: It's less work for everyone
2011-03-10
A polite act shows respect. But a new study of a common etiquette—holding a door for someone—suggests that courtesy may have a more practical, though unconscious, shared motivation: to reduce the work for those involved. The research, by Joseph P. Santamaria and David A. Rosenbaum of Pennsylvania State University, is the first to combine two fields of study ordinarily considered unrelated: altruism and motor control. It is to be published in a forthcoming issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.
"The way etiquette has been ...
Rutgers researchers identify materials that may deliver more 'bounce'
2011-03-10
NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. – Rutgers researchers have identified a class of high-strength metal alloys that show potential to make springs, sensors and switches smaller and more responsive.
The alloys could be used in springier blood vessel stents, sensitive microphones, powerful loudspeakers, and components that boost the performance of medical imaging equipment, security systems and clean-burning gasoline and diesel engines.
While these nanostructured metal alloys are not new – they are used in turbine blades and other parts demanding strength under extreme conditions – ...
When leukemia returns, gene that mediates response to key drug often mutated
2011-03-10
(MEMPHIS, Tenn. – March 9, 2011) Despite dramatically improved survival rates for childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), relapse remains a leading cause of death from the disease. Work led by St. Jude Children's Research Hospital investigators identified mutations in a gene named CREBBP that may help the cancer resist steroid treatment and fuel ALL's return.
CREBBP plays an important role in normal blood cell development, helping to switch other genes on and off. In this study, researchers found that 18.3 percent of the 71 relapsed-ALL patients carried alterations ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
New study documents functional extinction of two critically endangered coral species following record heatwave in Florida
UC Irvine researchers find new Alzheimer’s mechanism linked to brain inflammation
Ancient stone tools trace Paleolithic Pacific migration
New ‘molecular dam’ stops energy leaks in nanocrystals
Hidden toxins in e-cigarette fluids may harm lung cells
Ancient Mediterranean origin of the “London Underground Mosquito”
Functional extinction of Florida’s reef-building corals following the 2023 marine heatwave
Duck-billed dinosaur “mummies” preserve fleshy hide and hooves in thin layers of clay
Fatty winter snacks may trick the body into packing on the pounds
Hitchhiking DNA picked up by gene, saves a species from extinction
Cellarity publishes framework for discovery of cell state-correcting medicines in Science
Peatlands’ ‘huge reservoir’ of carbon at risk of release
Dinosaurs in New Mexico thrived until the very end, study shows
Miniscule wave machine opens big scientific doors
Sanger Institute: Origins of the ‘London Underground mosquito’ uncovered, shedding light on West Nile virus transmission
Global study reveals tempo of invasive species‘ impacts
Study uncovers origins of urban human-biting mosquito, sheds light on uptick in West Nile virus spillover from birds to humans
It’s not the pain, it’s the mindset: How attitude outweighs pain
Researchers find certain ecological experiments may be too human-centric
Gender equality universally linked to physical capacity
UC Irvine astronomers discover nearby exoplanet in habitable zone
New way to destroy a cancer-linked molecule revealed
Highly manipulated heterostructure via additive manufacturing
Robots that flex like US: The rise of muscle-powered machines
Obesity: A discovery shakes 60 years of certainty about fat metabolism
Guidelines for treating hereditary hearing loss with gene therapy from international experts
Chemistry: The key to civet coffee is in the chemistry
Glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists and age-related macular degeneration
Prenatal exposure to fine particulate matter components and autism risk in childhood
Light exposure at night and cardiovascular disease incidence
[Press-News.org] New study shows government spending preferences of AmericansSpending Study is the 27th in a series since 1973 by NORC at the University of Chicago