How Do Americans Really Feel About Elon Musk?

How Do Americans Really Feel About Elon Musk: Elon Musk, the new owner of Twitter, may not have any credibility as a pollster according to FiveThirtyEight’s scoring system, yet he still conducts surveys. Kinda.

The former richest man in the world took over Twitter in October and quickly instituted a new management style that let users vote on important decisions. Should the platform allow former president Donald Trump to re-join after apparently being permanently barred last year? Vox Populi, Vox Dei, as Musk put it, was the outcome after a narrow majority of users responded in the affirmative. Should Musk relaunch Vine, the brevity-focused video service, discontinued in 2016? Sure! Maybe! The populace has spoken.

The stakes of the polls suddenly increased. Elon Musk threatened his job security on Sunday by pledging to follow the findings of his illegitimate poll. He asked users, “Should I resign as CEO of Twitter?” By Monday, he knew the response: Respondents favored his resignation from the leadership position at the social media behemoth by 15 points, 57.5 percent to 42.5 percent. Musk declared on Tuesday that he would respect the poll’s results once he finds “someone foolish enough” to succeed him. When that will occur and how much power he will give up are also unknown.

Nevertheless, it’s unfortunate for Musk that he didn’t adopt a more systematic approach because, following several expert polls, Americans still have a reasonably favorable perception of Musk while having an unfavorable opinion of social media firms in general.

Related post:

• According To Ethereum Founder Vitalik Buterin, Elon Musk’s Bans Have Put Twitter On A ‘Path To Authoritarianism!
• Elon Musk Briefly Loses Title As Worlds Richest Person To Bernard Arnault of LVMH!

Start with Musk’s query on whether or not to resign. Although most respondents to his poll answered “yes,” a HarrisX overnight survey in the middle of December revealed that 61 percent of American Twitter users and 53 percent of American adults genuinely want Musk to remain in charge. Another poll conducted in December by Quinnipiac University indicated that opinions on how Musk manages the social media behemoth are virtually evenly divided among Americans: 37% said they favor the way he handles Twitter, 37% disagree, and 25% had no opinion.

And poll after poll demonstrates that Musk’s support among the American public isn’t exactly low. According to the same Quinnipiac survey, 33% of Americans said they had a wrong opinion of Musk, while 36% said they had a clear idea. (An additional 26% claimed they had not heard enough about him to form an opinion.) According to a YouGov/The Economist poll conducted in November, 41 percent of American respondents had a “very” or “somewhat” favorable opinion of Musk, while 37 percent had a “somewhat” or “very” unfavorable opinion of him. These findings are despite data suggesting that most Americans have negative perceptions of social media corporations. Quinnipiac, for instance, discovered that while 18% of respondents disagreed, 70% agreed that social media behemoths like Twitter and Facebook “cause more harm than good.” Another spring 2022 survey by the Pew Research Center asked people in 19 advanced economies about their opinions on social media, technology, and its impact on society. The results showed that 79 percent of Americans surveyed thought access to social media and the internet had widened partisan divides.

Should I step down as head of Twitter? I will abide by the results of this poll.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 18, 2022

People who have closely followed Twitter’s demise might be surprised to learn that Musk isn’t universally despised. He eliminated most of the company’s personnel in months, drove away significant sponsors, and suspended (then un-suspended) the accounts of several well-known journalists, among other things. It’s also important to note that not everyone is thrilled about Twitter’s new CEO. Republicans (63 percent) and white men (51 percent) were the groups most likely to have a favorable opinion of Musk among U.S. adults, according to Quinnipiac. The demographic groups least likely to have good attitudes toward Musk are Democrats (9%), Black respondents (17%), and women (25%)

Indeed, Musk’s overall favorability ratings have slipped since acquiring Twitter. In April, YouGov discovered that 49% of American adults had a “very” or “somewhat” favorable opinion of Musk, compared to 31% who had a “somewhat” or “very” unfavorable opinion of him.

Sadly, most polls asking respondents about their opinions of Elon Musk fail to elicit the reasons behind such judgments. Does his riches influence how others perceive him? Is his prestigious name ID making him more advantageous? Did his suspension of journalists, perceived unfavorably by most of those surveyed in a December CivicScience poll, lower his favorability ratings? Topline survey results don’t offer many hints. But we know that people think of Musk as a powerful, successful businessman who may also be eccentric. And this may be why Americans don’t hold him in particularly low regard despite his numerous Twitter gaffes.

For instance, when YouGov asked respondents to rate Musk’s influence in the tech industry, 80% of those polled responded that he had “extremely” or “very” power. The same sample was asked to choose words that, in their opinion, best-represented Musk in a different poll. Rich (60%); entrepreneur (49%); inventor (39%); and quirky (39%) were the victors (37 percent). According to a December YouGov poll, 58 percent of Americans think Musk is a “successful business person,” while 22 percent disagree.

Has Elon Musk genuinely left the world of Twitter, then? He doesn’t appear to be considering a complete or even partial retirement. He stated that his next move would be to “simply run the software & servers teams” after saying he would stand down as CEO as soon as he could find a sufficiently bumbling replacement. Therefore, Musk’s polling practices may be the most significant change to Twitter shortly (he appeared to agree with a user’s suggestion that only Twitter blue subscribers should now be able to vote in “policy-related” polls). Or perhaps Musk will genuinely step down and make room for someone else to take over Twitter in 2023 — hello, Snoop Dogg and Dionne Warwick. Your hunch is just as valid as mine.

Other Polling Bites

Would you rate your ability to wrap presents as poor? If so, recent YouGov polling results from December suggest that your humility might place you in the minority. According to their survey, 64% of American adults said they were “extremely” or “somewhat” proficient at gift wrapping. One-fifth of respondents, or 19%, claimed they were mediocre at gift-wrapping, while 11% said they were terrible. If you’ve never given a gift back to someone else, you’re also in the minority, according to YouGov. Only 31% of adult respondents said they had never done it. However, the majority admitted to having done it: 13 percent of respondents indicated they had regifted “many times,” 18 percent had regifted “many times,” and 29 percent had regifted “one or twice.”

A few national pollsters, like Marist, have been asking Americans about their least favorite words and phrases as the year ends. The winner or loser this year? “Woke.” A third of Americans, or 35%, believe that “awake” is the most irritating one to hear in conversation. The phrase “whatever” came in second (22%) and was followed by “it is what it is” (15 percent). But despite the GOP’s initial fight against “woke” and “wokeism,” some survey respondents — regardless of party identification — found the phrase irritating. In fact, “woke” was cited as the word that bothered voters the most by 31% of Democrats, 39% of Republicans, and 38% of independents. For context, Marist claims that “Trump” and “coronavirus” were the victors in 2021.

Now that the 2022 midterm elections are over, everyone’s attention is focused on the 2024 presidential election. Additionally, recent Morning Consult polling data indicates that people may be anticipating another head-to-head contest between President Donald Trump and Vice President Joe Biden (assuming the latter runs for reelection, which looks increasingly likely). According to Morning Consult’s polling of likely GOP primary voters1, Trump has a sizable lead (48%) over potential rivals like Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (33%), former Vice President Mike Pence (8%), Texas Senator Ted Cruz (3%), and others. However, when facing off against DeSantis, Trump finds it more difficult to prevail. When asked who they would support in a primary or caucus for the GOP if it were held in their state, 45 percent of respondents chose DeSantis, and 44 percent said Trump. Eleven percent of respondents claimed to be indifferent or unaware.

According to Gallup survey data that has just been made public, Americans’ opinions of their mental health are at an all-time low. The percentage of Americans who currently rate their mental or emotional well-being as “good” (31%) is the lowest Gallup has seen since asking respondents this question in 2001. However, the author points out that COVID-19 may be somewhat to blame for the downward trend. Before that, the “excellent” ratings for Americans were in the 40s. The percentage of persons who believed their mental health was in “good” condition fell to the 30s for the first time, at 34 percent, in late 2020, when those statistics started to decline. People between the ages of 18 and 34 (20%), those making less than $40,000 a year (21%), and women (6%) were the demographic groupings least likely to say that their mental health and emotional well-being were “good” (28 percent).

Which news stories stood out to Americans the most in a year that saw a significant election and the effects of a global pandemic? According to Morning Consult, the Uvalde shooting (73 percent), the overturning of Roe v. Wade (71 percent), the passing of Queen Elizabeth II (71 percent), and Hurricane Ian (71 percent) were this year’s most significant news events (70 percent). However, there was also a partisan divide in news importance. Republicans were more likely to rank Hurricane Ian (70 percent) as the top news event that they saw, heard, or read “a lot” about than Democrats (78 percent) and independent voters (72 percent) did. The Uvalde shooting claimed 21 lives. The Texas shooting came in fourth among GOP voters (69%) behind the disaster, Roe’s downfall (70%), and the death of the queen (70 percent).