February 27, 2003
Report & Analysis · Other Poll Releases
According to the most recent Peach State Poll, Georgians' confidence has increased since the introduction of the new electronic voting machines. The majority of Georgians (70 percent) report being very confident that their vote was accurately counted in the 2002 elections; when this question was asked in September 2001, only 56 percent of Georgians reported being very confident.
Poll results clearly indicate, however, that a large gap remains in the confidence level between races. For example, 79 percent of Whites report being very confident that their ballot was accurately recorded, while only 40 percent of Blacks share this same certainty.
The Peach State Poll is a statewide quarterly survey of public opinion conducted by the University of Georgia's Carl Vinson Institute of Government.
Other survey results:
* In addition to the confidence gap between races, there is a large gap in the reported voting turnout. Seventy-one percent of White respondents reported having voted in November 2002 compared with 51 percent of Black respondents.
* Georgians seem to have experienced a smooth transition to the new voting system. An overwhelming majority of Georgians (97 percent) reported having no difficulties in using the new voting machines.
* A plurality (29 percent) of poll respondents state that the most important problem facing Georgia today is the state of the economy. This is a dramatic increase from the 15 percent who believed it to be the most important issue in the previous poll. Education ranks second in level of importance with 27 percent of Georgians believing it to be the most important issue facing the state.
* The general mood of Georgians has also changed. Fifty-four percent of Georgians reported being satisfied with the way things are going in Georgia. This is a decrease of 11 percent from the September 2002 poll. At the same time, dissatisfaction with the way things are going rose to 39 percent, an increase of 9 percent from the September 2002 poll.
These data are taken from a Peach State Poll survey conducted between December 13 and December 21, 2002. The poll included 800 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.
