Poll: More Americans fear higher national debt than default

[alp227]

Source: The Washington Post

The debate over whether to raise the legal limit on government borrowing has riveted Americans, with a large majority worried about the potential consequences regardless of whether Congress votes to allow the national debt to keep increasing.

But when pressed to name their biggest concern, nearly half of respondents say they are alarmed by the prospect that the debt could grow beyond its current limit of $14.3 trillion, according to a new Washington Post-Pew Research Center poll. Only 35 percent say they are more worried about the risk of default and economic destabilization if Congress does not raise the debt limit.

The poll vividly illustrates the dilemma facing lawmakers as they approach an Aug. 2 deadline on the debt ceiling. While congressional leaders in both parties have acknowledged that the Treasury needs to keep borrowing to pay the government’s bills, lawmakers are likely to face voters’ wrath if they can’t prove that they are also working to rein in the spiraling debt.

On Tuesday, Vice President Biden emerged from a fourth round of debt-reduction talks with six lawmakers from both parties and announced that the group is on pace to reach an agreement on more than $1 trillion in spending cuts, part of a package aimed at smoothing passage of a debt-limit increase.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/poll-more-americans-fear-higher-debt-than-default/2011/05/24/AFiVZdAH_singlePage.html

[provis99]

1. damn stupid public.

The headline should read "More Americans fear higher national debt than total economic collapse"

[still_one]

2. were these the same "americans" who wanted the American car companies to go under, and not be bailed

out?

[Dawson Leery]

3. These are the same ones who supported the criminal Iraq War.

[Irritable Liberal]

4. Because most people don't pay attention

There will always be the 27% wingnut loonies bot for the average American defaulting on our debt is just way too arcane a subject. Friends who are Democrats/liberals but don't really follow politics don't understand the potential consequences.

[hay rick]

5. The poll question that wasn't asked.

Would you rather slash benefits for 100,000,000 Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries or raise taxes on 300,000 people making more than $1,000,000 a year?

[jwirr]

6. Most Americans are in deep personal debt - that is what they know.

Some have experienced a cc denial but of credit but it is debt that they have learned to fear in their personal lives - the fear transfers to their understanding of this problem.

[caraher]

7. Yes, and they've been misled to think all finances are like personal finances

We've been deliberately propagandized to think that the national debt is a crisis almost to the exclusion of anything else, such as people having jobs.

[jwirr]

8. Exactly. We have a lot of reeducating to do.

[The Wizard]

9. dumbest country on Earth (NT)