Sunny Mood at Midsummer

By GEORGE J. CHURCH

Americans take a brighter view of Reagan, the economy and the country

As the vacation season ripens to its fullest, Americans are heading to the beaches, tennis courts and backyard barbecue pits in their sunniest mood in nearly two years. The nation's problems, they think, look much less menacing, in particular, better than they did last winter and spring, largely because the recovery in the economy now seems to be genuine. Moreover, as the public's outlook on life in general brightens, so does its opinion of President Reagan, whose ratings are finally beginning to climb.

Those are the chief findings of a start-of-summer survey of American attitudes taken for TIME by Yankelovich, Skelly and White Inc.* There are puzzling crosscurrents, of the type that occur in every poll, but the upswing in optimism is unmistakable. In response to the broadest question, "How do you feel things are going in the country these days?" a solid majority of 57% answered either "very well" or "fairly well," vs. only 41% who replied "pretty badly" or "very badly." That marks a striking reversal from the last two polls: in March those who judged the nation to be heading downhill held the lead 54% to 45%, and last December the pessimists' edge was lopsided, 65% to 35%. Indeed, the current poll shows the first majority since September 1981 for those taking the upbeat view.

The state of the nation, of course, can improve markedly and still leave much to be desired. In fact, 58% of those questioned still rated it "not good," a response hard to reconcile with the general air of optimism. But that was the lowest proportion since November 1977, when it was 55% (for whatever reason, possibly simply high standards, "not good" has always held a majority in the TIME-Yankelovich polls). More significant perhaps, 48% now believe the country's problems to be "no worse than at other times," while 46% think that the U.S. "is in deep and serious trouble," the narrowest division in six years. Only six months earlier, in the December 1982 poll, the deep-trouble worriers were almost twice as numerous (62% of those polled) as the no-worse-than-usual group (33%).

The biggest reason for the turnaround in sentiment seems obvious. It is hardly surprising that public gloom was so widespread late last year; in the judgment of many economists, that was when the most painful recession since World War II hit bottom. Though many indexes of the economy began rising with the new year, their message at first was unclear. As recently as March, those polled by the Yankelovich firm split evenly, 49% to 49%, on whether a recovery had or had not begun. Now the doubt has been resolved. In the current poll, 59% said the economy really has started to improve, while only 38% believed the U.S. is still in "the throes of recession."

The June unemployment figures released last week provided further evidence that the recovery is real; at the same time, they made it clear that the recovery has a long way to go before true prosperity is restored. The civilian jobless rate dropped a tenth of a point, to an even 10%, continuing a creeping but steady decline from last December's postwar record of 10.8%. The June rate was the lowest since last August, but still higher than at any previous time since 1941. Such a slow decline in unemployment is characteristic of the early stages of recoveries; it reflects in part a return to active job seeking by people who had given up looking for work when the recession was at its worst. Some 1.1 million new jobs have been created since last December, but the number of people competing for them has grown only a bit less rapidly.

In any case, the recovery is visible enough for the poll results to give Ronald Reagan happy summer reading. The most surprising finding of the March survey was that, though the public was already beginning to turn more cheerful, the President's approval ratings were still dropping sharply. Possibly this was because many people were not yet convinced that the recovery was genuine. Now, as measurements of the economy have turned visibly more favorable, so have voter opinions about Reagan.

To be sure, 48% of those questioned have not changed their minds about the President. But 26% now think more highly of him, while 25% take a dimmer view than before. Statistically, that amounts to an even split, which in itself is a major change from March. Then, 35% had a worse impression of Reagan, while only 15% said his standing had improved in their minds. Asked to gauge the President's performance on the familiar scale of 1 to 10 (1 standing for "very poor," 10 for "excellent"), 54% of the voters this time gave him ratings from 6 to 10, while 44% chose scores from 1 to 5. That is almost exactly the opposite of the March resuits: 55% of those polled then accorded Reagan low ratings, while only 45% judged him favorably.

Again, the reason for the change is not hard to find. Among the majority who believe that the economy is recovering, 43% say Reagan is most responsible for the improvement. Runner-up is a feeling that "the economy goes up and down; it [the recovery] would have happened anyway" at a distant 25%. The Federal Reserve Board scored 13% and Congress 8% (behind the 11% for "not sure").

Also, the President seems to be winning converts to his view that the recession was the bitter price the nation had to pay to bring inflation under control. Some 54% of those questioned thought that the Reagan Administration has "made sufficient progress in solving inflation," while only 42% said it has not. That is a response of the highest importance to political calculations. Asked which of 15 issues would have "a lot of influence" on their choice of who should be elected President in 1984, 80% selected "policies on inflation," more than those who specified any other issue. Second place, at 75%, somewhat surprisingly went to "policies on improving education," an issue that is rising fast in public consciousness, in part because Reagan has highlighted it repeatedly in recent weeks.

Like the economy, though, the President still has a great deal of lost ground to make up. Some 54% of those polled said they would vote for "an acceptable Democrat" against Reagan next year, the same percentage as in March. The proportion choosing Reagan rose only from 27% to 30%. "An acceptable Democrat," of course, is a faceless abstraction who at this point outpolls all the flesh-and-blood Democrats competing for the White House. On a question designed as a direct measure of Reagan's appeal, those who hope the President will not run for a second term outnumber those who hope he will, as they have in each of the last six surveys. The hope-he-won't group, however, now prevails only 46% to 42%; three months earlier the split was 51% vs. 37%.

While giving Reagan high marks for containing inflation, the public continues to be dismayed by the slowness of the decline in unemployment. Almost exactly two-thirds of those questioned think the Administration has not made sufficient progress in reducing the jobless rate; only 29% say it has. And though they put inflation at the top of the list of 1984 election issues, many voters are more worried right now by unemployment. Asked which they were "personally more concerned" about, joblessness or rising prices, 49% of those surveyed replied "unemployment," vs. 35% for inflation.

In addition, Reagan continues to be viewed less favorably by female than by male voters on just about every question that the pollsters raise. Contrary to popular belief, the gender gap yawns wider on economic than on foreign policy issues. For example, large majorities of both sexes--71% of men, 64% of women--express at least some confidence that the President is dealing effectively with the Soviets on arms control. But only 53% of the women believe that the economy is improving, vs. 65% of the men. On Reagan's strongest issue, inflation, the division is even more striking. Men are satisfied with Reagan's progress in bringing price rises under control, 61% to 35%; but 48% of women are not satisfied, while 47% are, which statiscally makes them evenly divided. The bottom line: while half of the men surveyed hope that Reagan will run for reelection, only 35% of the women do.

--By George J. Church

* The survey polled 1,007 registered voters by telephone from June 27 to 29. The sampling error is plus or minus 3%. When compared with results of previous TIME-Yankelovich polls, the potential sampling error is plus or minus 4.5%. This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.