Forty-five percent of Americans say they recently made a special effort to buy products made in the United States. When asked why, these shoppers mainly cited patriotic or altruistic goals related to the national economy, including creating and keeping jobs in the U.S., rather than product-specific considerations such as quality, safety, or cost.
More specifically, the most common reasons for "buying American" were to support the U.S. or to be patriotic, mentioned by 32% of adults who sought out U.S.-made products in recent months, and to keep or create jobs in the country, mentioned by 31%. Additionally 20% said that buying U.S.-made products is good for the U.S. economy in general.
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
Patriotism and Purchases
A major theme of our book is that narrow economic self-interest does not explain everything in politics, and that motivations such as patriotism are an important part of political and civic life. Gallup reports:
