Does Sunny read the articles before he writes the headlines?

Or does he just want people to read the articles based on their reaction of “that can’t be right”.

Invariably it isn’t.

@ Pagar

“Does Sunny read the articles before he writes the headlines?”

To be fair, it’s literally true. Some Brits do want more spending on public services. So it’s as accurate as having a headline saying: Brits Live In Sheffield.

@ Chaise

The clear implication is that “Brits” implies the majority of Brits.

Anyway, some much more startling results of the survey Sunny managed to miss.

“Twenty years ago, 26 per cent agreed that if benefits were less generous, people would stand on their own two feet. Now that view is shared by 54 per cent. In 1991, 58 per cent wanted more spending on welfare benefits. That had fallen to 35 per cent when the recession began in 2008 and is now at 28 per cent.”

Discuss.

If you ask A if he wants B to spend more money on A for which C will be taxed, it would be a surprise if A said no.

The real surprise is that people don’t vote accordingly.

@ 3 pagar

“The clear implication is that “Brits” implies the majority of Brits.”

Agreed. The source article is just plain wrong, too; it says “most Brits”.

The data suggest that increasing spending is more popular than cutting it, but that’s not the same thing. Crucially, we don’t know which way the 55% of people who are happy with spending being where it is would fall if they were forced to pick between increases and cuts.

“Anyway, some much more startling results of the survey Sunny managed to miss.

“Twenty years ago, 26 per cent agreed that if benefits were less generous, people would stand on their own two feet. Now that view is shared by 54 per cent. In 1991, 58 per cent wanted more spending on welfare benefits. That had fallen to 35 per cent when the recession began in 2008 and is now at 28 per cent.”

Discuss.”

Could be a number of things. Have benefits become more generous? Has the number of people on benefits increased? Have people been basing their policy on Shameless? We’ve certainly had a lot of media chatter and political rhetoric about lazy claimants and fraud, although I don’t know if that’s increased in the last two decades. Also, the effects of recession on this sort of thing are kinda unpredictable. Do tougher times cause people to feel more empathy for their fellows, or close ranks?

@ Andreas

“If you ask A if he wants B to spend more money on A for which C will be taxed, it would be a surprise if A said no.

The real surprise is that people don’t vote accordingly.”

Well, many do. But others vote on their conscience, or just don’t see this as the main issue, or want to support the party that will give them the best value for money, but are ignorant about which party this is.

Somewhat different interpretation over at the Daily Mail:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2204341/British-Social-Attitudes-study-Half-population-think-immigration-bad-economy.html

In case of any niggling doubts about public preferences as expressed in the survey, try today’s headline report in the FT:

Increase in support for more public spending
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c29f340a-fe5f-11e1-8228-00144feabdc0.html#axzz26jTfmH11

@ Bob B
Did you read the article or just the headline?
Increase from 1 in 5 to 1 in 4.
Significantly less than the number who are net beneficiaries of transfer payments. So there are people receiving more state aid than they pay in tax who DO NOT want an increase in public spending.