A week ago, I didn't know who Howard Schultz was. Now I do, and have read a substantial number of opinion pieces saying that he shouldn't run for president because he has no chance of winning. Some of the reasons are good, like the barrier the Electoral College creates for third-party candidates and the scarcity of real independents, but I want to talk about a bad one: the claim that few people want the social liberal/economic conservative combination that he seems to be offering. Several cited a report by Lee Drutman which estimated that 3.8% of voters are in this group, as compared to 44.6% liberal on both, 22.7% conservative on both, and 28.9% liberal on economics, conservative on social issues. That is a total of 73.7% liberal on economic issues, and 48.4% liberal on social issues.
Saying that about half of people are liberal on social issues seems reasonable, but over 70% liberal on economic issues? Drutman's measure of economic liberalism includes questions on how important Social Security and Medicare are to the respondent, whether the economic system is biased in favor of the wealthiest Americans, and whether the distribution of money and wealth in this country is fair. These are all questions on which large majorities are on what he counts as the "liberal" side. However, they are not really liberal/conservative questions: that is, they don't involve a choice between different policies. The person who says that the distribution of income is unfair doesn't necessarily support liberal policies for doing something about it--he or she might think that nothing can be done, or that those policies wouldn't do any good, or just be expressing general cynicism.
David Leonhart says "large majorities of Americans oppose cuts to Medicare and Social Security and favor expanded Medicaid. They favor higher taxes on the wealthy and corporations. They favor a higher minimum wage and more aggressive government action to create jobs. " That's basically right, although the majority in favor of higher taxes on the wealthy and corporations is not very large (e. g., in 2012, 50% said the Bush tax cut for people with incomes over $250,000 should come to an end, 43% that it should not). However, there are also economic issues on which people are conservative: in 2016 43% said we were spending too much on welfare, and only 22% said we were spending too little; there is generally strong support for things like drug tests and work requirements for public assistance.
In general, people are more favorable to programs that help "deserving" people (like retirees or people with jobs), that give people things they need (like medical care) rather than just giving money, and that require employers rather than taxpayers to provide benefits. Most people also like tax cuts, even if they know they are skewed towards the rich, and are wary of tax increases, even tax increases on the rich. That doesn't mean people favor spending cuts--they seem to think that the government can find the money somewhere or other. Overall, majority opinion doesn't fall neatly into a left-right spectrum on economics. It's a distinctive combination that isn't really represented among political elites, mostly because both business interests and professional economists (of all ideological types) are opposed to it. Both liberals and conservatives can appeal to some elements of it, but not others.
Returning to Schultz, I think there is a substantial constituency for the combination he's offering--people who are socially liberal, and more interested in cutting taxes than in expanding programs.
PS: I think liberals do have some advantage on economic issues, not because of specific policy issues, but because of the image of caring about the middle and working classes. Conservatives have an advantage on social issues because of the image of being committed to patriotism, religion, and family. One of the barriers to an independent candidate is that they can't draw on either of these.
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