Surprising American survey about the Hungarian youth

A profound survey covering several topics was published a few days ago, reports index.hu. It was made in March by the American International Republican Institute (IRI) in Hungary.

Although the survey is not about party politics, it is worth mentioning that John McCain, chairman of the organization, has a definite opinion about Viktor Orbán, as he called him a neo-fascist dictator in 2014. When the senator was competing with Barack Obama for being president in 2008, the Hungarian head of government said the Republican candidate had more chance to win because he was “a national hero in the most ancient sense of the word”.

Crushing vision

The survey made in March but published only now was interested in what Hungarians think about the country’s domestic politics and international situation. Ipszos helped IRI, and the survey included personally asking a thousand people’s opinion.

According to the survey’s first chart, half of the Hungarians believe that Hungary is heading in the wrong direction, while 38 per cent thinks otherwise.

It is more crushing when asking people if the youth has a good future in Hungary: 26 per cent answered yes, while 74 per cent no.

People seem to disagree on what Hungary currently needs. 45 per cent think it is stability and continuity, which means that the current government should stay in power, while 50 per cent wants change. 39 per cent of the latter would change the whole government, but there is another opinion as well: 23 per cent would only change the internal leadership of governing party Fidesz by letting in new members. Relatively many people (38%) want constitutional, systemic change.

Generations have different opinions on this matter. 27 per cent of people aged 18-29 would settle for the current opposition party to govern, while 45 per cent wants a more serious, systemic change. This rate is the other way round among people above 60: 55 per cent wants to change only the government, while 28 per cent the whole system.

The government’s pride in trouble

One of the most interesting results of this survey is what Hungarian people consider to be the biggest problem in Hungary. Surveys like this tend to offer several answers from which the interviewees can choose; this time, however, interviewees had to give their own answers.

Most of them (28%) believe the biggest problem is poverty and social inequality, this is followed by corruption (15%) and unemployment (13%). The fact that so many people consider unemployment a huge problem in Hungary seems to contradict that unemployment data the government always proudly quotes.

It is also telling that although László Kövér believes that Hungarian healthcare is world-class, 12 per cent of Hungarians think the condition of healthcare is Hungary’s biggest problem. Compared to these four biggest problems, the other ones seem to be dwarfed by them: the government’s always hot topic – immigration control – is only considered a big problem by 4 per cent. This question is further shaded by the fact that people think it is more of Europe’s problem than that of Hungary. 19 per cent think this is the continent’s biggest problem, while 26 per cent believe it is terrorism.

Answers were also remarkable to the question of what has the greatest likelihood of threatening our way of life and our children’s future. Most of the people (34%) believe it is bankruptcy and the disappearance of health and social security systems, but another 28 per cent think it is terrorism, extremism and political violence.

It seems that the two-year-long mantra of the government was also effective, as almost a fifth of Hungarians (19%) think that the demographic change of the country is a real threat. It is also contradicted by the fact that only 3 per cent are afraid of the country losing its culture and values.

Half of the Hungarians don’t believe Putin

A number of questions deal with where Hungarians see their country between the East and the West. One of them asked the interviewees to rate on a scale from 1 to 5 if Hungary has more in common with Western Europe or with Russia in a few areas.

Regarding healthcare, pensions and other social benefits, only 30 per cent think that the Hungarian system is identical with the Western European countries, and 16 per cent consider it similar. However, twice as many people think it is identical with or similar to the situation in Russia. Again a 19 per cent of the Hungarians believe that their standard of living is similar to that of the Western countries, while 37 per cent think it is more similar to the standard of living in Russia.