I read an article the other day about a recently completed annual Gallup poll with results I don’t find surprising.
The poll indicated that in 2025, only about 59% of United States citizens gave high ratings when asked to evaluate how good their life will be in about five years. While that number might sound high, it’s the lowest amount since Gallup began asking the question almost 20 years ago.
Founded by George Gallup in 1935, Gallup, Inc. is based in Washington, D.C. and is well-known for conducting no-nonsense public opinion polls worldwide. So, this isn’t a report concocted by a fly-by-night special interest group designed to promote some sort of agenda, it’s data produced by what could only be called a legitimate source.
And as I mentioned, I ain’t shocked.
In fact, I believe the result depicts how many people are being awakened to the fact that things aren’t about to get better and are likely to further deteriorate in a relative hurry. Just look in every direction; there seems to be little or nothing that isn’t being negatively affected, and it feels like we’re all one big explosion – or other calamity – away from the type of global change that nobody wants to endure.
A Gallup official said that when Americans are feeling good about the present, that leads to a more optimistic viewpoint of the future. But the poll’s results show that while satisfaction with current life has declined over the last decade, future optimism has dropped even more.
“While current life is eroding, it’s that optimism for the future that has eroded almost twice as much over the course of about the last 10 years or so,” he said.
I know there are still plenty of people wearing rose-colored glasses, so to speak, who believe that technological advances and cash thrown in a certain direction will soon change everything for the better. I also realize that it’s easy for folks to turn a blind eye and even accuse so-called whistleblowers of being overly pessimistic.
So be it, but that doesn’t change the fact that necessities are becoming radically expensive, and world affairs are messed up to a point that would have been incomprehensible not that long ago.
I got into a great conversation last week with a woman who came to the newspaper office on business. She said she was new in the area and was glad to have escaped the madness of living in Northern California. As we talked, she lamented the current state of life in general and wondered aloud what things might be like in the future. She said that since she was somewhat elderly, she was on her way out and likely wouldn’t have to face “what’s coming.”
But she also expressed sincere concern about the hardships today’s younger people will probably have to deal with.
Indeed. I hesitate to imagine what that might look like, but I don’t feel confident that it will be pretty.
Anyway, remember the final scene of the 1985 movie “Runaway Train,” in which John Voight is standing on top of the runaway diesel engine not knowing what’s about to happen, but knowing full well it wasn’t going to be good?
Unfortunately, I think perhaps that’s us.
And poll results show I’m not alone.