Half of the Hungarians think that the future is gloomy

According to metropol.hu, Europeanism is more important to Hungarians than the EU average. However, Eubarometer’s newest survey also says that half of the Hungarians think that Hungary and the European Union are going in a bad direction. The European Commission has been surveying twice a year how EU citizens think about the union for more than 40 years. The data for the latest survey was taken between the 7^th and 17^th of November, 2015.

Just like in most countries, most Hungarians (94%) feel themselves connected to their homeland, while Europeanism is still more important to them (66%) than the EU average (57%). Although, this doesn’t mean that Hungarians are satisfied with everything that’s been going on in the EU. Compared to last spring, the rate of those who think that the living conditions (59% compared to last year’s 69%) and the economy (53% compared to last year’s 62%) in the union are better than in Hungary decreased. Entrepreneurs and North- and West Transdanubians see Hungarian procedures more optimistically than the average, while the EU procedures are seen more optimistically by the 15-25 age groups, the North Hungarians, West Transdanubians and entrepreneurs. On the other hand, the 65-74 age groups, the inactive, those living in a unipersonal household and the right-wingers are much more pessimistic than the average.

From the aspect of the development direction of EU, Hungarians most value the free movement of EU members (77%) and the public energy policy (69%), and these are followed by public safety and defense policy, public foreign policy, the unitary digital market, public immigration policy and the free trade agreement between the EU and the USA.

People think that the immigration crisis is the most important problem throughout the European Union. While the percentage of those that find immigration one of the two most important problems grew from 38% to 58% on average, this number grew from 43% to 68% in Hungary.

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Copy editor: bm

Source: http://metropol.hu/