The Nebraska Values Project is a public opinion research initiative of the Holland children’s Institute. In partnership with Myers Research & Strategic Services, a live telephone survey was conducted in early November 2017 to measure public opinion among Nebraska voters on public policy issues and demographic research affecting children and working families across Nebraska.
Nebraskans overwhelmingly support more attention from the state toward building the middle class through investing in healthcare and education at every level, and providing better opportunities for good paying jobs, retirement and benefits. A broad agreement exists among Nebraska voters – state elected officials should give families the tools they need to succeed, instead of eliminating community programs and further cuts to spending. Across the board – Nebraskans believe state government’s priorities are not aligned with those of voters, and the majority say our elected officials are not looking out for average families in Nebraska, and are focused only on helping corporations and the wealthy.
What Nebraskans believe the state’s priorities should be:
Highlights from Installment IV:
- Nebraskans placed the highest level of importance on career and vocational training expressing near unanimity (96%) who believe it should be a focus of investment in the state budget and a large majority (67%) saying it should be of major or largest focus.
- Nebraskans believe that providing incentives to businesses to create quality jobs with benefits, are key components to building a stronger middle class (78%). Paid family leave (71%) and paid sick leave (77%) were also strongly supported.
- A vast majority of Nebraskans believe expanding after school and voluntary pre-kindergarten will help build a stronger middle class (71%), and free community college classes (69%), and it should be noted that a majority of conservatives favor free community college (60%), and providing parents with state tax credits for early childhood programs (62%).
- Access to affordable child care is incredibly popular across the board. Among those with children under age 18 at home, nearly all favor expanding access to affordable child care (93%), and of those without children at home are also in favor (69%).
- Almost unanimously Nebraskans believe the state should be focusing on providing health care services for children (91%), support Medicaid (88%) and providing mental health care (94%).
The margin of error associated with these data at a 95 percent confidence level is +/-4.0 percent.
