74 per cent of statistics are dangerous
Some 74 per cent of the British people think we are set for a serious and prolonged economic downturn according to a poll. Some 61 per cent think it likely someone they know will lose their job within the next year.
Either the populace is more expert in economic affairs than they are given credit for or the pollsters are measuring fear rather than reality.
As 12 per cent of those polled think they will lose their own jobs in the next year they are either predicting a catastrophic economic collapse or they are professional pessimists. Personally, I think the latter more likely.
The poll was conducted by a recognised research company – Ipsos Mori – even if the sample size (1,016 in total) was becoming dangerously small by the time it was split into only those with mortgages and split again by age and gender. It illustrates however the difference between asking people about events they control and those on which they merely have an opinion.
Asking whom people will vote for in an election is statistically legitimate because people control their own vote; asking who they think will win is testing their estimate of other people’s actions. They are likely to repeat back the views of commentators – or regurgitate the results of a previous opinion poll.
That the same poll found 62 per cent of Conservatives think it likely the Tories will come to power within a year compared with only 38 per cent of Labour supporters suggests the Conservatives polled hope, not think, their time is imminent.
Yet if 74 per cent of people think there will be a severe slowdown and one in eight workers expect to lose their job, that is not only a measure of their wild guesswork but of their potential actions. Nevermind whether these people talk themselves into recession or unemployment, if they act as though that is happening they will affect the economy.
For what it is worth, people over 55 are significantly less pessimistic on the economy that the younger people polled. The ones who have seen it all before are less worried by the state of the national finances than those over-reacting to their first downturn.
