WorldPublicOpinion: "American public support for the free market economy has dropped sharply in the past year, and is now lower than in China, according to a GlobeScan poll released today.
The findings, drawn from 12,884 interviews across 25 countries, show that there has been a sharp fall in the number of Americans who think that the free market economy is the best economic system for the future.
The results mean that a number of the world's major emerging economies have now matched or overtaken the USA in their enthusiasm for the free market. The Chinese and Brazilians, 67 percent of whom regard the free market system as the best on offer, are now more positive about capitalism than Americans, while enthusiasm in India now equals that in the USA, with 59 percent rating the free market as the best system for the future.
Among the 20 countries polled in both 2009 and 2010, an average of 54 percent today rate the free market economy as the best economic system, unchanged from 2009.
Americans with incomes below $20,000 were particularly likely to have lost faith in the free market over the past year, with their support dropping from 76 percent to 44 percent between 2009 and 2010. American women have also become much less positive, with 52 percent backing the free market in 2010, down from 73 percent in 2009."