Tuesday, December 06, 2016

TRUMP'S DROP-IN-THE-BUCKET CARRIER DEAL POLLS BETTER THAN OBAMA'S BIG AUTO RESCUE

The polling looks good for Trump and Pence's Carrier deal:
Donald Trump’s first major action as president-elect -- the deal he and Vice President-elect Mike Pence struck last week with Carrier Corp. -- is earning high marks from American voters, a new Politico/Morning Consult poll shows.

... Sixty percent of voters say Carrier’s decision to keep some manufacturing jobs in Indiana ... gives them a more favorable view of Trump. That includes not only 87 percent of self-identified Republicans, but also 54 percent of independents and 40 percent of Democrats.

Only 9 percent say it makes them view Trump less favorably, while 22 percent say it doesn’t have an impact either way.
By contrast:



Why the difference?

First, some Democrats are willing to give Trump credit for the deal. In the Politico poll, you see that 40% of Democrats say the Carrier deal makes them more favorably disposed to Trump.

By contrast, Republicans would never give President Obama credit for anything. In the 2012 Gallup poll cited by Luntz and The Hill above, only 25% of Republicans favored the rescue of the auto industry.

Beyond that, please note the way the auto rescue was framed. It was regularly called a "bailout" -- and the word "bailout" probably reminded voters of the bailout of the financial industry, which infuriated many of them. In that Gallup poll the question was:
Now, thinking back to one of the major actions taken by the federal government in the last four years, would you say you approve or disapprove of the financial bailout for U.S. automakers that were in danger of failing?
It was also seen as a giveaway to the industry, even though most of the money involved was in the form of loans. So in CNN polling, which showed that the rescue was unpopular in 2010, 2012, and 2014, the question was:
Looking back, do you think the federal government should have provided financial help in 2009 to U.S. automakers who were in financial trouble, or should these companies have been allowed to succeed or fail on their own?
But in a 2012 Pew poll, the rescue was popular -- 56% of respondents thought it was good for the economy and only 38% didn't. Why? Maybe because Pew's question referred to loans.
The government also gave loans to General Motors and Chrysler during this period. Do you think this was mostly good or mostly bad for the economy?
The Republican narrative throughout the Obama years was that the president spent money with no sense of responsibility. That became the story much of heartland America believed. In the case of the Carrier deal, the opposition party isn't driving the narrative. (Democrats never do, do they?)

The Carrier deal saved only 800 jobs -- 730 union jobs plus 70 salaried positions. Cost, as far as we know: $7 million in tax breaks. That's $8750 per job.

The auto rescue saved 1.5 million jobs. A 2014 study said it cost taxpayers $9 billion. That's $6000 per job --for a lot more jobs and a lot more ongoing economic activity.

But Republicans told the story of the auto rescue, just as Republicans are telling the Carrier story. So the polls go their way in both cases.

5 comments:

Grung_e_Gene said...

In 2006, Delphi Automotive closed 21 of 29 US plants. By 2009 Delphi was torn apart by Vulture Capitalists only too keen to void Union contracts and out-source the jobs to Wage Slave Nations.

This is the exact plan Mitt Romney had for GM and Chrysler. The Voiding of Union contracts and the offshoring of jobs and factories to China.

The reason Romney wanted to "Let Detroit Go Bankrupt" was because Bain Capital would have swooped in, canabalized the remnants, jettisoned the UAW contracts, sold the factories off to China and skimmed the profits from the bones of GM and Chrysler while perched waiting for Ford to go belly up as well.

c u n d gulag said...

I wanna know where this liberal media is that I've heard about for the whole of my 58 years of life!

Can someone tell me?
Is it a secret?
Would you have to kill me if you told me?
I'll take that deal!
I'm gonna die miserable, so I might as well enjoy some bliss before I go...

Yastreblyansky said...

That's $9 billion not recovered out of a $79 billion investment. In 2011 Treasury predicted a loss of $24 billion.

It's nice to look at it in the context of the entire recovery program for banks, auto companies and others in which many financial institutions are still in the red too but overall taxpayers have realized a profit of $72 billion.

Lit3Bolt said...

Frank Luntz rules our world. The man is a modern Goebbels.

Never Ben Better said...

It certainly hasn't helped that no matter what Obama did, for a segment of the highly vocal left it was never good enough. Bitch all you want about the White House not doing a good enough selling job, but when one's supposed allies are constantly blaring that everything sucks, it's not good enough, it's a sellout and a flop, and besides, they demanded it and forced Obama to do it so it's not his accomplishment anyway, and well, why should the lazy MSM do anything but pull up another "Dems in disarray" story template, stir in the GOP's message of the day attack, and conclude it's another failure?