According to the Wisconsin Economic Scorecard for the second quarter, while a majority of residents (56 percent) say Wisconsin is “headed in the right direction,” only 28 percent view the economy as “good” and just 1 percent say it is “excellent.”
By comparison, 61 percent of the residents believed the state was headed in the right direction in the first quarter.
The proportion of Wisconsin residents who characterize the state economy as “poor” increased to 23 percent, up from 18 percent last quarter.
The Wisconsin Economic Scorecard is a quarterly poll of Wisconsin residents conducted by the Center for Urban Initiatives and Research (CUIR) at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in cooperation with WisBusiness.com and Milwaukee Public Radio (WUWM 89.7).
The tracking poll measures perceptions of the health of Wisconsin’s economy, personal economic circumstances of Wisconsin residents and public opinion regarding important state economic issues.
The poll for the scorecard was a random digit dial (RDD) landline/mobile telephone survey of 560 Wisconsin residents, conducted from June 3-6.
Other major findings on the Scorecard included:
- While spending on non-necessities such as restaurants and entertainment has increased slightly, so has the incidence of serious personal financial problems, such as affording home payments and paying for retirement.
- Delaying work on major road construction projects is the most?preferred option for covering the shortfall in the state’s transportation fund; specifically, delaying an expansion of I?94 between Milwaukee and Illinois is supported by a majority (51.6 percent) of registered voters. Gasoline tax and passenger vehicle user?fee increases and the introduction of toll roads on some Wisconsin highways are the least?preferred options for covering the transportation fund shortfall.
- Public confidence in the ability of the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC) to fulfill its mission of bringing jobs to the state has decreased from 52 percent in November to 40 percent in June.
The research brief for the scorecard is available at http://www4.uwm.edu/cuir/research/wi-econ-scorecard.cfm.
