March 22, 2023
In the wake of the recent turmoil in the banking industry, only 10% of the public has a great deal of confidence in the nation’s banks and financial institutions, and 56% say the government is not doing enough to regulate the industry.
Trust in the banking industry declined since 2020, when 22% said they had a great deal of confidence in the people running it[1]. The lack of confidence is bipartisan. Only 10% of Democrats and 8% of Republicans have a great deal of confidence in banks.
[1] The public outlook remains gloomy
People in both parties also share low confidence in the military and Congress. But Democrats have more confidence in the executive branch, diplomatic agencies, and intelligence gathering agencies than Republicans. Republicans have more confidence in the Supreme Court than Democrats.
Fifty-six percent of adults, including 63% of Democrats and 51% of Republicans, consider government regulation of the banking industry insufficient.
The public continues to have a negative opinion about the state of the national economy, while people are more positive about their own financial situation. Democrats are more positive about both the national economy and their own economic condition.
Thirty-five percent of the public say their household’s level of debt is higher than a year ago, while 46% have about the same level of debt. Seventeen percent are currently carrying less than debt than a year ago.
About half of the public expect the national economy and the state of country will decline over the next year, with Republicans more than twice as likely as Democrats to expect things to get worse.
The nationwide poll was conducted March 16-20, 2023 using the AmeriSpeak® Panel, the probability-based panel of NORC at the University of Chicago. Online and telephone interviews using landlines and cell phones were conducted with 1, 081 adults. The margin of sampling error is +/- 4.0 percentage points.
- Suggested citation: AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. (March 2023). “Few have confidence in financial institutions” apnorc.org/projects/few-have-confidence-in-financial-institutions/
