September 18, 2002
Report & Analysis · Other Poll Releases
Georgians are generally satisfied with the way things are going in the state, according to the most recent Peach State Poll survey. The overall satisfaction level is up slightly from the previous quarter (from 61 percent to 65 percent). In June 2002, 65 percent of respondents said they were either very satisfied (18.5 percent) or somewhat satisfied (46.9 percent). Nearly one in four respondents (23 percent) from the Atlanta region said they are very satisfied with the way things are going in the state, as compared to 14 percent of respondents from the rest of the state expressing that level of satisfaction. The Peach State Poll is a quarterly survey of public opinion conducted by the University of Georgia's Carl Vinson Institute of Government.
Despite the general level of satisfaction, Georgians are ambivalent about the current economic climate. Respondents were about as likely to say the economy is getting better (42 percent) as they were to say it is getting worse (39 percent);15 percent of respondents say the economy is neither getting better nor getting worse. Only 3 percent of Georgians rate current economic conditions as excellent, while 11 percent rate them as poor; the vast majority of Georgians rate economic conditions as either good (42 percent) or fair (42 percent).
Other survey results:
* Georgians are far more likely to feel proud of their country than of their state, county or neighborhood. Asked which level of community they feel most proud of, 63 percent of respondents selected their country. This is consistent with the high levels of patriotism and unity witnessed since September 11, 2001
* A plurality of respondents (36 percent) also feel more connected to their country than to their state, county, or neighborhood. With the exception of the country, however, the smaller the community, the greater the sense of connectedness: neighborhood (30 percent), county (21 percent), and then state (10 percent).
* Education is the most important problem facing the state of Georgia. In June 2002, 27 percent of respondents mentioned education in response to an open-ended question about the most important problem facing the state; 15 percent cited the economy or jobs, and another 12 percent cited dissatisfaction with government as the most important problem.
These data are taken from a Peach State Poll conducted between June 10 and June 17, 2002. The poll included 801 telephone interviews of randomly selected adults in Georgia. For a sample of this size, the margin of error at the 95 percent confidence level is +/- 3.5 percent.
