Nearly four out of five Hispanics feel that the U.S. economy stabilized

According to the newest Ipsos-Telemundo telephone poll, nearly four out of five Hispanics feel that the economy has stabilized or that it has already started to improve. Among 500 adult Hispanics living in the United States, 14% say that that the U.S. economy has turned the corner on the economic crisis and 63% say that the economy hasn’t yet begun to improve, but that it has stabilized. However, 20% say the worst is yet to come.

The poll results suggest that Hispanics are more optimistic than the general U.S. public about the current state of the economy as they are more likely to say it has stabilized or started improving. In an Ipsos/McClatchy telephone poll conducted among 1,076 adults of all ethnicities living in the U.S. during the same period of time, only 11% said the economy had turned the corner (compared with 14% among Hispanics) and only 55% that it had stabilized (vs. 63%) while as many as 31% said the worst is yet to come (vs. 20%). In both surveys, 3% said they weren’t sure.

Among Hispanics, optimism is most prevalent among those who live in the West of the United States and those who prefer watching television in Spanish over English:

* 17% of those living in the West say the economy has turned the corner (vs. 12% of those in other regions) and only 16% say the worst is yet to come (vs. 23%).
* 17% of those who prefer watching television in Spanish say the economy has started improved (vs. 10% of those who prefer it in English) while only 15% expect it to get worse (26%).

Also of note, Hispanic women (68%), more than Hispanic men (58%) or women of all ethnicities (56%), are particularly likely to say the U.S. economy has stabilized but not yet begun to improve.

These are some of the findings of an Ipsos-Telemundo poll conducted from February 11 to March 7, 2010 with a nationally representative sample of 500 Hispanics aged 18 and older, interviewed by telephone via Ipsos’ U.S. Hispanic Omnibus. With a sample of this size, the results are considered accurate within 4.4 percentage points, 19 times out of 20, of what they would have been had the entire adult population of Hispanics in the U.S. been polled.

The findings of the general population poll are based on an Ipsos poll conducted February 26-28, 2010 on behalf of the McClatchy Company. For the survey, a nationally representative, randomly selected sample of exactly 1,076 adults aged 18 and older across the United States was interviewed by Ipsos. With a sample of this size, the results are considered accurate within 2.99 percentage points, 19 times out of 20, of what they would have been had the entire adult population in the U.S. been polled.

All sample surveys and polls may be subject to other sources of error, including, but not limited to coverage error, and measurement error. These data were weighted to ensure that the sample's composition reflects that of the actual U.S. population according to U.S. Census figures. In both polls, respondents had the option to be interviewed in English or Spanish.