Despite all the talk, worry over jobs is back as Americans' top concern, Gallup finds

You probably could never guess what problem Americans see as the No. 1 job for the No. 1 elected official to address right now:

It's jobs/unemployment -- again -- still.

That's been the major concern along with the overall economy across the country for way more than a year now. Exactly 353 days ago in his 2010 State of the Union address, President Obama asked himself: "How long should we wait?" Republican Scott Brown had just pulled off an historic Senate election upset in Massachusetts, in large part over voter unhappiness with the president's healthcare preoccupation instead of the stagnant jobs situation.

Twenty-three months ago in a speech at the Caterpillar factory in Peoria, Ill. (see photo above), the new president promised that the economy would recover with many thousands of new jobs if his economic stimulus package passed Congress. Which it did. But they didn't.

Last Saturday in his weekly remarks, the president said the usual about jobs, that he was encouraged by some growth in hiring but he knew it wasn't enough and more jobs would be arriving real soon. When the ....

... administration fought for that economic stimulus package two years ago, the argument was that those billions would hold the unemployment rate below 8%.

Last month unemployment was 9.4%, and the president has tried to argue that was an encouraging sign of progress.

In the last 62 years the unemployment rate has only exceeded 10% twice (1982 and last year), and 1975 was the only other year to exceed 9%.

So, it is perhaps not surprising that the Democratic president's ruling congressional party paid a historic price in last November's midterm elections. Nor is it surprising that the new Gallup Poll finds unemployment/jobs are again the top concern of Americans.

Not only that but a separate Gallup survey this morning reports that a whopping 93% of Americans thiknk it is Extremely or Very Important that Obama and Congress address the economy's problems, 89% say that about unemployment and 84% feel that way now about the federal deficit.

Obama was going to talk economy this week during a photogenic trip to Schenectady, N.Y. But that plan, like most other things political, was postponed after the Tucson shootings.

This coming week the president is rolling out the literal red carpet for the state visit of China's president, Hu Jintao. And the week after that is the State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress.

But job concerns are not waiting among impatient voters. The new Gallup results show 29% of Americans list jobs/unemployment as the top worry, having surpassed concern with the economy (26%) just in the last month.

The No. 3 economic concern is the deficit, which has doubled in the last 12 months from 6% to 12%. The No. 3 concern overall is healthcare (13%), but that's barely half the percentage that listed it in 2009.

Right behind the deficit at 11% is dissatisfaction with government, including the president and Congress. Also corruption. Way down the list are immigration (6%), war (5%) and lack of respect for each other (2%).

But Gallup also points to a simmering concern that could hold potential political impact for the 2012 cycle -- fuel prices.

Concern there, as gas prices passed through $3 a gallon, is only at 3% now. But when gas prices surged to $4 a gallon in mid-2008, concern surged too (up to 25%), which didn't do the ruling White House party any good come that November's balloting.

RELATED:

Congress job approval jumps sharply as Republicans take control of the House

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo: Scott Olson / Getty Images (February 2009, Obama in Peoria, Ill., promises thousands of new jobs if his economic stimulus package passes Congress).

Comments

[Byron]

Nice informative article. Yes, the jobs have not come back, and experts say that they won't for at least until 2012, and then only very gradually. In spite of this the experts say that the US economy is improving, but without much job growth.

What I ask is, how in the world can the US economy improve when so man millions of Americans have no jobs or only low-paying art-time work, and when so many foreclosures will hit the market this year?

Personally I do not see how the economy can improve under these conditions. Certainly specific companies can do well, but how long can they be sustained by a population that can't afford rent?

The stock market is also said to be due for a corrections, and the first week of this year 770K people filed for initial unemployment claims (435K was the seasonally adjusted number). And what if the job situation doesn't just remain stagnant, but gets worse, as it very well may since no jobs = downward spiral = additional job losses.

[Thaddeus]

GOP has always been an economic disaster for the U.S. economy.
Remember Bush & a Republican congress implemented every aspect of the bankrupt economic policies of Reaganomics for eight years.

The result?
U.S. economy suffers greatist downturn since the "Great Depression"
U.S. banking system in ruins
U.S. auto makers file for bankruptcy

Remember:
Republican President Herbert Hoover caused the Great Depression
Republican President George W. Bush caused the Great Recession

Any Questions ??

[Relevance is as Relevance Does]

Hey, you like polls Andy? I found this tidbit in an unbiased news source.

A new national poll shows an improvement in how Americans see the direction of the country, and puts President Obama in better standing against potential 2012 rivals.

You're welcome

[Hey Thaddeus]

Sounds like you went to the OBL school of economics and of course,the sheik
never mentioned Frank and Dodds calamitous Fred and Fannie democrat
recipees for the housing disaster.Recessions were on when both Reagan and Bush came to power and because they did not piss away the first year of their mandates on deficit growing and job killing entitlement programs,the jobs did
come back at a much healthier pace.Why do you think the economy is still shedding jobs(450000 just last week) despite the gazillion stimulus and record
government spending ?The economy under Bush and Reagan was producing
as many as 300000 jobs a month 2 years in their first mandate.The only real
question is:are you better off now than you were under Bush and Reagan ?
Gulag nostalgic Stalinists are an endangered species and the market for more
socialo/marxist garbage is fast disappearing.

[eeodonnell]

Ronald Reagan created a larger deficit than all the presidents who held office before him combined. So large in fact that the Republican Congress cut his budgets. Republicans don't spend government money on "entitlement" programs - i.e. - any program that would help the average Joe sixpack - but spend like drunken sailors they always do and leave the mess up to the next Democratic president to clean up. Clinton struggled mightly and did so; Bush's wars, the Wall Street fiasco and the hollowing out of the job market for American citizens might make it impossible to ever return to the decent standard of living the American middle class attained in post-war years. None of us should be feeling secure about the future.