STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- 54% believe federal government is too powerful, similar to past years
- 53% say government doing too many things to solve nation’s problems
- Twice as many say there is too much rather than too little business regulation
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A 54% majority of Americans say the federal government has too much power, while 39% say it has about the right amount of power and 6% say too little. These figures have generally been stable throughout the Donald Trump and Joe Biden presidential administrations. Since 2005, no less than 50% of Americans have said they believe the federal government is too powerful, with some of those readings reaching 60%.
These results are based on Gallup’s annual Governance survey, conducted Sept. 1-16.
Americans have typically believed the federal government has too much power, except in the first three years after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Between 2002 and 2004, about half of Americans said the government had the right amount of power, while close to 40% said it had too much.
At no point in Gallup’s trend have more than 9% of U.S. adults said the government has too little power.
The stability in the overall numbers masks large shifts by Republicans and Democrats tied to the party of the sitting president. Generally speaking, Republicans and Democrats are more inclined to say the government has too much power when the president is from the other party, and less inclined when a president from their own party is in the White House. But since 2009, Republicans have been consistently more likely than Democrats to say the government is too powerful, just by larger margins under a Democratic president than under a Republican president.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/403124/majority-continues-say-government-powerful.aspx