Near-Term Optimism Is Rising—Especially Among Republicans

Americans are strolling into the new year with a bit more spring in their steps, thanks to the imminent return of Donald Trump to the White House and the long-awaited end of the Biden-Harris era.

The last time the calendar year reached its inevitable conclusion, 30 percent of Americans said the 12 prior months had been terrible for the country, and another 26 percent said it had been bad, according to the annual year-in-review survey from YouGov. That’s a pretty awful 56 percent of Americans with a downbeat view of the experience of our Republic.

This time around, the survey found that 22 percent of Americans view the last year as terrible, and 27 percent said it has been bad, a seven point move away from negativity. Among Republicans, those saying the past year was terrible fell from 44 percent to 26 percent. Among Democrats, this figure climbed from 11 percent to 18 percent.

When asked to predict the coming year, 18 percent of Americans say the new year will be great for the country, and 21 percent say it will be a good year. That’s up from eight percent who saw great things ahead for 2024 and 15 percent who thought the year would be good. Eighteen percent say this will be a terrible year, down from 23 percent, and 17 percent say it will be a bad year, down from 20 percent.

You will not be surprised to learn that there’s a large partisan tilt to public opinion about the coming year. Thirty four percent of Republicans expect a great year, and 36 percent expect a good year, making the GOP a party of 70 percent optimists. At the end of 2023, just seven percent of Republicans expected a great year, and eight percent expected a good year. Just three percent expect 2025 to be a terrible year, down from 33 percent a year ago.

Democrats were not all that hopeful about 2024—and have become less optimistic about 2025. A year ago, 13 percent of Democrats expected a great year, and 28 percent expected a good year. Now just nine percent expect a great year and 10 percent expect a good year. On the pessimistic side, 37 percent of Democrats say they expect it will be a terrible year for the country, up from nine percent going into last year.

Longer-Term Prospects Look Better Too

Longer-term expectations have also shifted. Forty-four percent of Americans now say they expect the next 10 years to be better for themselves personally, an increase from 38 percent a year ago. Thirty-six percent say they expect the coming decade to be better for the country, up from 24 percent a year ago.

Republicans have seen a 20-point rise in their personal expectations for the next decade, with 53 percent now saying they expect it will be better versus 33 percent a year ago. Sixty-three percent of Republicans say the coming decade will be better than the prior 10 years, up from 26 percent a year ago.

Even Democrat optimism has slipped a bit when it comes to how they think they’ll fare personally—and crashed on the broader question of how the country will do. Thirty-eight percent of Democrats think the coming decade will be better for them personally, down from 46 percent a year ago. But just 18 percent say the think it will be a better decade for the country, down from 32 percent a year ago.

The main takeaway from the party-affiliation analysis is that the surge in GOP optimism has more than overcome the decline among Democrats, both for personal and national expectations.

Separately, Gallup’s most recent polling found that 58 percent of Americans think Trump will be able to improve the economy, and 39 percent think he will not. Fifty-four percent say they expect Trump will cut their taxes. Forty-seven percent of Americans say they think Trump will be able to reduce prices of groceries and other goods, but 51 percent say he will not.

This is not exactly a description of a nation experiencing economic euphoria. A better characterization would be realistic and cautious optimism. Which is certainly an improvement from how so many of us felt for most of the past four years.