By Jacob Ogles
FloridaPolitics.com
April 5, 2022
In most of the state, voters feel Florida is on the right track.
The latest polling from the Florida Chamber of Commerce shows Floridians are optimistic about the state’s future but pessimistic about the nation’s.
A release from the Chamber included highlights from a Cherry Communications survey. It characterized the results as evidence Florida voters are “bullish on Florida.” While the release didn’t include right track-wrong track numbers statewide, it said voters in eight of 10 Florida media markets believe the state is headed in the right direction.
The outliers were the Miami-Fort Lauderdale market, where 45% say the state is going the wrong way and 40% say it’s moving in the right direction, and the Tampa-St. Petersburg market, where 49% gave a negative answer and 45% gave a positive one.
But the survey says six in 10 Florida voters believe the country is on the wrong track.
The poll results include responses from 605 voters statewide, including 237 Democrats, 243 Republicans and 120 others. Pollsters reported a margin of error of 4 percentage points.
Beyond the numbers on general sentiment, the poll also measured public opinion on several topics regarding job creation. Particularly among Republicans, the polling found positive feelings.
About 57% of Florida voters believe the state “provides better opportunities for the next generation than other states.” That includes 78% of Republicans, 63% of male voters and 50% of voters with no party affiliation.
The feeling also persists among the bulk of the next generation. About 54% of voters between the ages of 18 and 29 hold the view about Florida holding greater opportunities.
The Chamber used that data point to tout its Future of Work Florida initiative. The effort aims to bring together industry leaders and business owners to address a “talent crisis” in the state.
When announcing the poll results, the Chamber also made note of trends in voter registration data, spotlighting the fact that Democrats’ share of registered voters is declining in all 67 counties of the state since the 2020 election. That’s largely thanks to huge growth in Republican registrations, and analysts predicted Republicans’ recently obtained edge in voter registrations could surpass 100,000 when the next voter file is released.
This survey does not pass muster for statistical meaningfulness, and the article is full of self-promoting conclusions. The survey is too small to have relevance in a state our size. Also, the change in voters registrations has less to do with more Republicans getting registered as it does a far greater number of No Party Affiliations being registered. Like most business-oriented groups, the Chamber continuously tries to provide an upbeat projection in the hopes that people will continue spending money. This article is more of a marketing tool than any kind of accurate assessment of the state of citizens’ feelings about the economy.
My contacts in other states, such as California, describe empty stores, vacant shopping centers, and people moving out of state. This is NOT what I see here in Florida. All over Florida, we see crowded shopping areas, and rarely an empty storefront. This survey makes sense, as we can clearly see this with our own eyes.
Depends if the nation holds together. Undoing the umbrella civil rights protections of our 14th Amendment has real ramifications – long term.