Gallup: Most Iranians see local economy getting worse

June 11 (UPI) -- A Gallup World Poll showed Tuesday that most Iranians see their economy as worse off since the U.S. decision a year ago to leave the Iran nuclear deal.

Within a few months after U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from the Iran deal, a record-high 57 percent of Iranians said the local economy was getting worse, the Gallup survey showed.

Iran's economy has gotten even worse since then with the World Bank downgrading the country's economic outlook a third consecutive time as of last week.

One in six Iranians worked full time in 2018, which was "on the higher end of what Gallup has tracked since 2012," but it's "still one of the lower figures in the region, similar to Iraq, Morocco and Palestinian Territories, and higher only than the 6 percent in war-torn Yemen," Gallup writer Julie Ray said.

The poor economic climate prompted record-low confidence in their economic outlook and quality of life.

A record-low of 7 percent of Iranians said it was a good time to find a job, the poll showed. On the other hand, a record-high 34 percent of Iranians saw their lives "suffering."

Last week, Trump said the U.S. sanctions since leaving the Iran nuclear deal have crippled Iran's economy and now "they're failing as a nation."

Still, recently Iran's President Hassan Rouhani has compared the economic stress the country has endured under the U.S. sanctions to economic hardships during the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s and said Iranians would not back down, so things could get worse.

The Gallup World Poll for Iran includes 1,002 phone interviews from July to August of 2018.