The majority of Louisianans—58%—believe the U.S. economic system unfairly favors the wealthy, according to the fifth installment of the 2016 Louisiana Survey.
The survey, a project of the LSU Reilly Center for Media and Public Affairs, was released today and it focuses on what Louisiana residents—in a state that has long been marked by high poverty and economic inequality—think are the causes and solutions of economic and social challenges.
Previous installments of the 2016 Louisiana Survey measured Louisiana’s attitudes about education, the state budget, quality of life and national and state politics. The latest installment reveals deep contrasts and double standards regarding how people view the rich and poor, as well as solutions to addressing poverty in Louisiana.
According to the survey, Louisiana residents tend to believe being rich does not necessarily mean that more well-to-do individuals work harder than people of lower socio-economic statuses. Instead, those surveyed say “rich” means that some individuals have opportunities that others do not have.
That’s a much different view than most of the Louisiana residents surveyed expressed about poor residents, the survey found. Those surveyed were more likely to say being poor resulted from a lack of effort rather than circumstances beyond one’s control.
“In other words, Louisiana residents are more likely to attribute wealth to fortunate circumstances than to individual effort, but also more likely to blame poverty on individual effort than on unfortunate circumstances,” reads a report accompanying the survey results.
Overall, 76% of Louisiana residents favor raising the state’s minimum wage to $8.50 an hour, the survey says, noting the overwhelming support for a higher minimum crosses political party lines. Democrats and independents, 88% and 83% respectively, favored a higher minimum wage, while 59% of Republicans surveyed also said they are in favor of the state raising the hourly pay of workers.
The survey comes at a time when Gov. John Bel Edwards is attempting to get the legislature to approve a bill that is crucial to his legislative package. The bil minimum wage bill would raise the state’s per hourly pay to $8 per hour in 2017 and increase it again to $8.50 per hour in 2018.
A Louisiana senate committee approved the bill on March 31. The minimum wage is currently $7.25 per hour.
The public proved to be deeply divided, especially among party lines, on government policies to redistribute wealth to the poor, according to the survey. The majority of Democrats—67%— were more likely to say that raising taxes on corporations and individuals to expand programs to help the poor would reduce poverty more than lowering taxes on wealthy people and corporations to encourage investment and economic growth. The majority of Republicans—61%—believe the opposite.
—Alexandria Burris
