Inequality and Public Opionion

This talk will present a framework for understanding how, in the United States, public opinion about inequality, economic opportunity, and redistribution are related to one another in ways that are at odds with key tenets of American exceptionalism, such as American dream and free market ideologies. The framework posits that Americans connect rising and high levels of economic inequality to a restriction of economic opportunities that in turn motivates support for opportunity-enhancing policies (e.g., in education and employment). McCall and collaborators test this model using survey experiments and new survey questions in nationally representative surveys, including, for comparative purposes, in Sweden and Denmark.