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Pliny's Point on March 14, 2017
March 14, 2017: An average of recent polls shows 39 percent think the U.S. is moving in the right direction. This number is unchanged from last week, despite new polling data from Rasmussen Reports. The average is up ten points since tracking began on President Donald Trump's inauguration day. The polls in today's average range from 33 to 46 percent of respondents who said the country was on the right track. All of these polls are listed below.
| Source | Date range | Sample size | % who think the U.S. is headed in the right direction | Margin of error (+/-) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rasmussen Reports[1] | 3/5 - 3/9 | 2500 likely voters | 42% | 2% |
| USA Today/Suffolk University[2] | 3/1 - 3/5 | 1000 registered voters | 46% | 3% |
| Economist/YouGov[3] | 3/6 - 3/7 | 1359 registered voters | 33% | 3.4% |
| Reuters/Ipsos[4] | 3/3 - 3/7 | 1662 adults | 34% | 2.7% |
| Politico/Morning Consult[5] | 3/2-3/6 | 1992 registered voters | 43% | 2% |
| Wall Street Journal/NBC[6] | 2/18 - 2/22 | 1000 adults | 40% | 3.1% |
| CBS News[7] | 2/17 - 2/21 | 1280 adults | 35% | 3% |
Methodology
For Ballotpedia's presidential approval, congressional approval, and direction of the country polling results, we take an average of the most recent polls on one or more of these topics conducted by 12 sources. Polls may be included in the average for up to 30 days, though this timeline may be adjusted to account for major news events as we attempt to balance the need for a larger sample of results with the need to remove outdated information. For a full description of our methodology and polling explanations, see: Ballotpedia's Polling Indexes.
What's in a name?
Pliny the Elder, a scholar from the Roman Empire, is most well known for writing the encyclopedic work Naturalis Historia, or “Natural History.” His extremely thorough work covered everything from botany to technology. Naturalis Historia, one of the largest Roman works that still exists from the first century A.D., became an example for future encyclopedic works through its formatting, references, and comprehensiveness.
Today, Ballotpedia works to preserve and expand knowledge, just like Pliny did hundreds of years ago. One of the features of Ballotpedia, the encyclopedia of American politics, was a daily statistic called Pliny’s Point. Each day, between January 20, 2017 and September 1, 2017, readers learned where Americans stood on the direction of the country, or their approval of elected officials.
Click here for more Pliny's Point articles.
See also
Ballotpedia daily polling averages:
Stay in the know:
- The Weekly Brew
- The Daily Brew
- You're Hired: Tracking the Trump Administration Transition, 2016-2017
- Policy issues under the Trump administration, 2017-2021
- 115th United States Congress
- Special elections to the 115th United States Congress (2017-2018)
Footnotes
- ↑ Rasmussen Reports, "Right Direction or Wrong Track," March 13, 2017
- ↑ USA Today, "USA TODAY Poll: Tweets and temperament are tripping up President Trump," March 7, 2017
- ↑ YouGov, "The Economist/YouGov Poll," March 6-7, 2017
- ↑ Ipsos, "Reuters/Ipsos Data: Core Political," March 8, 2017
- ↑ Morning Consult + Politico, "National Tracking Poll," March 2-6, 2017
- ↑ Wall Street Journal, "NBC News/Wall Street Journal Survey," February 18-22, 2017
- ↑ CBS News, Poll: Immigration is most important problem for Trump and Congress," February 23, 2017
