I copy my top comment from previous post about key events explaining the rises and drops (1):
* Truman early huge drop: end of WW2 patriotism & strike wave of 1945–1946
* Truman continuous drop: 1950-53 Korean War & 1951 dismissal of General Douglas MacArthur
* Johnson continuous drop: Vietnam war & ghetto riots
* Nixon huge drop: 1972 Watergate scandal & 1973 oil crisis & 1973–1975 recession
* Ford drop: 1974 presidential pardon to Nixon
* Carter drop: 1979 energy crisis
* Reagan drop: 1986 Iran–Contra affair
* Bush rise: 1990-91 Gulf War patriotism
* Bush huge drop: recession & he instituted new taxes after promising he wouldn’t
* GW Bush huge rise: 9/11
* GW Bush continuous drop: 2003 Iraq war & 2005 Hurricane Katrina handling & 2008 financial crisis
(1) Based on my research, mainly on Wikipedia. No need to say I’m not an historian, so please feel free to add or correct this list.
But I didn’t expect it to be the last update, given that Gallup stopped its polls, for no apparent reason.
tda18 on
I’d like to point out that Trump has the third lowest approval rating among all presidents when you look at it according to the presidents’ presidency time. The other two being Truman and Ford
(Meaning that all but 2 presidents had lower approval ratings than Trump 24, 1 year into their terms)
Mak8427 on
Interesting the Obama U shape
minaminonoeru on
I have always believed that the heyday of the ‘American empire’ was during the Clinton era.
SeppoTeppo on
You can see the hyperpartizanship so clearly in this. Hard to even imagine what could budge someone’s approval from about 40% at this point.
TheMardii on
It would have been nice with either means for each presidency or an overall mean score.
myturn19 on
What really stands out is how compressed the movement is in recent years. The large approval swings we saw in earlier decades have largely flattened out. Seems like voters are far more entrenched in their political beliefs, with opinions that are much less responsive to events or performance. That level of stability is striking. Almost sad.
9 Comments
Data source: [https://news.gallup.com/poll/116677/presidential-approval-ratings-gallup-historical-statistics-trends.aspx](https://news.gallup.com/poll/116677/presidential-approval-ratings-gallup-historical-statistics-trends.aspx)
Tools: Matlab & Powerpoint
I copy my top comment from previous post about key events explaining the rises and drops (1):
* Truman early huge drop: end of WW2 patriotism & strike wave of 1945–1946
* Truman continuous drop: 1950-53 Korean War & 1951 dismissal of General Douglas MacArthur
* Johnson continuous drop: Vietnam war & ghetto riots
* Nixon huge drop: 1972 Watergate scandal & 1973 oil crisis & 1973–1975 recession
* Ford drop: 1974 presidential pardon to Nixon
* Carter drop: 1979 energy crisis
* Reagan drop: 1986 Iran–Contra affair
* Bush rise: 1990-91 Gulf War patriotism
* Bush huge drop: recession & he instituted new taxes after promising he wouldn’t
* GW Bush huge rise: 9/11
* GW Bush continuous drop: 2003 Iraq war & 2005 Hurricane Katrina handling & 2008 financial crisis
(1) Based on my research, mainly on Wikipedia. No need to say I’m not an historian, so please feel free to add or correct this list.
A month ago I did a similar post with exactly the same data but with a 3 month average here: [https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/1q763ye/](https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/1q763ye/)
But I didn’t expect it to be the last update, given that Gallup stopped its polls, for no apparent reason.
I’d like to point out that Trump has the third lowest approval rating among all presidents when you look at it according to the presidents’ presidency time. The other two being Truman and Ford
(Meaning that all but 2 presidents had lower approval ratings than Trump 24, 1 year into their terms)
Interesting the Obama U shape
I have always believed that the heyday of the ‘American empire’ was during the Clinton era.
You can see the hyperpartizanship so clearly in this. Hard to even imagine what could budge someone’s approval from about 40% at this point.
It would have been nice with either means for each presidency or an overall mean score.
What really stands out is how compressed the movement is in recent years. The large approval swings we saw in earlier decades have largely flattened out. Seems like voters are far more entrenched in their political beliefs, with opinions that are much less responsive to events or performance. That level of stability is striking. Almost sad.