According to a Zogby International survey, people who consider themselves left-leaning have shown themselves to be less informed on economic issues than people who are right-leaning. In order to form this conclusion Zogby asked 4,835 adults eight basic questions about economics to determine their knowledge. The questions are summarized as follows:
1.Do restrictions on housing development make housing less affordable?
2.Does the mandatory licensing of professional services increase the prices of those s services?
3. Is the overall standard of living higher today than it was 30 years ago?
4. Does rent control lead to housing shortages?
5. Does a Company with the largest market share have a monopoly?
6. Are Third World workers working for American Companies overseas being exploited?
7. Does Free Trade Lead to Unemployment?
8. Do minimum wage laws raise unemployment?
The correct answers to these questions are: 1 yes, 2 yes, 3 yes, 4 yes, 5 no, 6 no, 7 no, 8 yes.
According to Zogby, people who were very conservative or libertarian missed 1.3 and 1.38 questions respectively on average. Those who were conservative missed an average of 1.67 questions. Those who were moderate missed an average of 3.67 questions. Liberals missed an average of 4.69 questions and those who were progressive or very liberal missed an average of 5.26 questions.
Breaking it down by party affiliation, Libertarians missed 1.26 questions, Republicans missed 1.61 and Democrats missed 4.59 questions.
The results of this survey indicate strongly that the farther left one is in his ideology, the more ignorant he is about economic issues. Needless to say, some of us are not the least bit surprised by this.
This would be amusing if it were not for the fact that the people who appear to know the least about economics are the ones making the most big decisions. There is nothing amusing about the results of their decision making.