Opinion polling on El Salvador's current reality

The Institute for Public Opinion at the University of Central America released results of polling done in August regarding the current situation in El Salvador.  You can find the full report here.

Here are some points of interest:

Nayib Bukele still has a high job approval rating (7.64 out of 10), although the IUDOP says this is the lowest rating he has held during his term in office.

The Legislative Assembly also gets a passing grade (6.27  out of 10), although those polled do believe that the deputies in the Assembly work more for their political party than the good of the people.

The principal problems people see confronting the country are:

  • Crime / insecurity   21.8%
  • Economy   19.5%
  • The COVID-19 pandemic  16.9%
  • Unemployment    12.7%
  • Poverty    7.2%
  • High cost of living    4%
  • Bad government policy    3.5%
  • Violence    2.7%
  • Gangs    2.6%
  • Corruption    2%
  • Politics / politicians / parties    1.7%
  • Bad / lack of education    0.9%
  • The new currency / Bitcoin    0.9%
  • Inequality    0.7%
  • Another problem    1.5%
  • Don't know, not responding    1.3%

One third of respondents described their families economic situation as bad or very bad, while 47.2% described their family economics as good or very good.  And almost 30% would emigrate in the next year if they could.

Some 60% of respondents said that Bukele's plan to grow the military by 10,000 soldiers as part of Phase IV of his Territorial Control Plan will help reduce crime some or a lot.

68% of those persons familiar with El Salvador's decision to introduce Bitcoin as legal tender disagree with the decision, and there is wide-scale confusion about the digital currency.

Only 29% of those polled say their preferred political party is Bukele's Nuevas Ideas party, which is much greater than ARENA (3.7%)  and the FMLN (1.4%), but is dwarfed by the 60% who say they are not part of any political party.

The stated religion of poll respondents was 40.7% Catholic, 36.1% Evangelical and 20% none or atheist.

The primary source of news for Salvadorans was television (55.9%) followed by social media (32.7%).

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