Is Everybody Happy? The Public and Health Care Reform

One of the toughest things about public opinion and health care reform is figuring out how the public goes from the personal to the political. Surveys consistently find the public says the health care system needs an overhaul, but also find most are satisfied with their own coverage.

Obviously, it's one thing for people to believe the health system needs fixing, but quite another to think they're going to benefit from that personally. There are two pieces worth reading on this:

• First, it looks like the people who need health care the most are the ones who are less satisfied. Low-income people and those who say they're in poor health are less satisfied with their health insurance, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, which does much of the best public opinion work on health care. And even those who give their insurance good ratings aren't immune to having problems with bills. One in seven of those who say their coverage is "excellent" and one in five who rate it "good" say they've had trouble paying medical bills in the past year.


• Second, over at Pollster.com, Mark Blumenthal looks at a number of different health care surveys and points out that while there's considerable skepticism about reform, there's also a lot of concern about the implications of doing nothing. We noticed the same "damned if you do, damned if you don't" pattern in surveys back in July.

These are both good examples of what you can find out by probing a little deeper on public opinion surveys. The fact is, on many issues public views are surprisingly nuanced, more so than many politicians and journalists think. That's both a challenge and an asset for policymakers, and a major reason why leaders who spend hours poring over polls still end up surprised by what the public actually does.