By Jon A. Krosnick, Nuri Kim, and Bo MacInnis.
Polling Americans about climate change reveals a largely united desire for government action—and other surprises.
On many issues, public opinion is so evenly divided that it does not provide a clear signal to government—but that’s not true on the issue of climate change. During the past 17 years, our research team has been tracking Americans’ opinions. Most recently, we teamed up with RFF to conduct in-depth surveys of Americans on climate change and energy policies. Polls were administered in December 2013 (in partnership withUSA Today) and again in June 2014 after the Obama administration's proposal on June 3 to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from existing power plants through the Clean Air Act.
Our surveys suggest that Americans have been overwhelmingly “green” on climate change issues for many years, despite a barrage of natural disasters, media events, and campaign speeches that one might have imagined would impact such opinions.
As the Obama administration continues its efforts to restrict greenhouse gas emissions, these surveys allow us to compare the administration’s actions with the American public’s beliefs about global warming and preferences regarding government efforts to address it.
The Fundamentals
Over the years in which we’ve tracked public opinion, we have seen very little change in various “fundamental” beliefs about climate change:
Has the Earth been warming?
- According to our latest survey results, 73 percent of Americans believed that the world’s temperature has probably been increasing over the past 100 years, down a little from the 77 percent we observed in 1997 (Figure 1).
Has warming been caused by human activity?
- Seventy-eight percent of Americans said that if warming has been happening, it’s been due to human activity—the same percentage we found in 1997 (Figure 1).
Will warming continue?
- And 76 percent said that the world’s temperature will probably go up during the next 100 years if nothing is done to prevent it.
Is warming a threat?
- In 2013, 60 percent of Americans said that the increase in the world’s temperature during the past 100 years was a bad thing.
- Sixty-six percent of Americans said that if the world’s average temperature goes up 5 degrees Fahrenheit during the next 75 years, that would be bad as well, about the same as the 61 percent of Americans who said so in 1997.
- Only 32 percent of Americans said in 2013 that global warming will hurt them personally either a great deal or a lot if nothing is done to reduce it in the future, but 67 percent believed that global warming will hurt future generations a great deal or a lot.
- Eighty-one percent of Americans said that global warming will be a very serious or somewhat serious problem for the United States.
- An equally large majority, 83 percent, said global warming will be a very serious or somewhat serious problem for the world if nothing is done to reduce it.
These majorities have been quite consistent over the years since 1997. So we see that most Americans are “green” on this issue, and they have been for some time.
