Vibe shift?, part 2

 My last post looked at opinions on how Donald Trump was likely to do (or had done) as president.  This one is about general ideological inclinations, as measured by answers to "some people think the government is trying to do too many things that should be left to individuals and businesses. Others think that government should do more to solve our country’s problems. Which comes closer to your view?"  This question has been asked by a number of survey organizations:  in 1974 and 1975, and pretty frequently starting in 1983.  I show the logarithm of the odds ratio of "do more to solve" versus "too many things":  that is, higher values represent more liberal views.  

There is a lot of variation between surveys taken at approximately the same time, which I think is because answers are influenced by context.  People like some things that government does and dislike others, so if the question follows questions about health or education, it's likely to get more "do more" responses than if it follows questions about taxes or whether the government wastes a lot of money.  However, there is clearly some longer term variation, so I also show a smoothed estimate. 

The last two times the question was asked were April and September 2024.  In April, opinions were quite liberal--16th highest out of 164 observations.  In September, they were more conservative--95th highest, and the most conservative since 2014.  So you could argue that there really was a vibe shift in 2024.  Given sampling error and unexplained short-term variation, I wouldn't put much confidence in that, but it is consistent with the data.  

Taking a somewhat longer view, here are the means by Presidential administration*:

There is a "thermostatic" pattern in which opinions are more liberal during Republican administrations.  That suggests that the vibes may shift again soon, especially if Trump continues to give Elon Musk free rein.**

*"Nixon" includes one from the Nixon and one from the Ford administrations.  The others have between nine and 48 observations.  

**Although I predict that within six months Trump will fire Musk, invent a dumb nickname for him, and take some sort of punitive action against his businesses.  

[Data from the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research]