UPI Poll: Obama picks up point on Romney

WASHINGTON, Oct. 1 (UPI) -- U.S. President Obama holds a slim lead over Republican rival Mitt Romney with just over a month until Election Day, a United Press International poll indicated.

Forty-nine percent of likely voters said they would vote for Obama on Nov. 6 while 46 percent said they would back Romney, results of the UPI-CVoter poll released Monday indicated.

This week's percentages show a 1 percentage point increase for Obama over last week.

Forty-nine percent of likely voters said they approve of the job Obama is doing as president, while 47 percent said they disapproved and 4 percent said they were unsure, results showed.

More than two in three said they expected their financial situation to improve during the next year, while about the same number said it likely would remain the same, results showed. Fourteen percent said they feared their personal financial situation would worsen.

However, nearly 42 percent said the national economy would emerge from its malaise only after two or three years, results showed. Eighteen percent said they expected the economy to improve before the end of two years.

In a separate poll, Obama was selected over Romney by more adults as the person who would be better to handle tax reform.

Overall, 43 percent of adults said they preferred Obama while 37 percent said they back Romney.

Results are based on national telephone surveys of 940 adults, including 855 likely voters, conducted Sept. 23-29. The margin of error for the total sample is 3.5 percentage points and the margin of error for likely voters is 4.5 percentage points.