CHICAGO, Oct. 22 (UPI) -- Confidence in the U.S. financial system is waning, a university-sponsored survey found.
The Chicago Booth/Kellogg School Financial Trust Index, associated with business schools of the University of Chicago and Northwestern University, measures confidence in banks, the stock market, corporations and mutual funds.
Confidence in June was rated at 25 percent. In the October survey, confidence had dropped to 23 percent, CNN reported Saturday.
Confidence in banks suffered the sharpest drop, falling from 39 percent to 33 percent.
Reflexively, anger has risen.
"Nearly 60 percent of respondents in our survey said they are angry or very angry about the current economic situation -- the highest level of anger we've found since the earliest months of the financial crisis," said Luigi Zingales, a co-author of the Financial Trust Index.
In the survey, two-thirds of respondents indicated creating jobs should take precedent over pruning back the country's deficit.
When the same question was linked to President Obama, however, many Republicans did an about face.
Asked, "Do you agree with President Obama" that jobs are more important than deficit reduction, 28 percent of Republicans agreed. Without mentioning Obama, 39 percent of Republicans indicated agreement.
When linked to Obama, 85 percent of Democrats agreed, while 90 percent agreed when the president was not mentioned in the question. Among independents there was no change -- 65 percent agreed jobs were more important than deficit reduction, with or without Obama being mentioned.
