Pliny's Point on April 27, 2017

About Pliny's Point

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By Ballotpedia Staff

April 27, 2017: An average of recent polls shows 37 percent of Americans think the country is moving in the right direction, down one point from last week. An average of 56 percent believe the country is on the wrong track. Individual poll results featured in today's average range from 29 to 47 on the positive side and 52 to 59 on the negative side.

Source	Date range	Sample size	% who think the U.S. is headed in the right direction	Margin of error (+/-)
Economist/YouGov	4/23 - 4/25	1,295 registered voters	29%	3.1%
Reuters/Ipsos	4/21 - 4/25	2,165 adults	30%	2.4%
CBS News	4/21 - 4/24	1,214 registered voters	36%	3%
NBC / Wall Street Journal	4/17 - 4/20	900 adults	34%	3.3%
Politico/Morning Consult	4/13 - 4/15	1,992 registered voters	47%	2%
Rasmussen Reports	4/16 - 4/20	2,500 likely voters	42%	2%
IBD/TIPP	3/24 - 3/30	904 adults	39%	3.3%

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account for major news events as we attempt to balance the need for a larger sample of results with the need to remove outdated information.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

• Pliny's Point

Ballotpedia daily polling averages:

• Presidential approval
• Congressional approval
• Direction of country

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