Voters support federal workers in survey

The majority of American voters believe the country needs a positive view of the federal government and its workers, according to a study released Thursday by the Partnership for Public Service.

"The postelection buzz is about values and how they divide us, but one value that unites Americans is a belief in the potential of government as an instrument for good," said Max Stier, president of the Washington-based partnership. "The majority of American voters say they want our leaders to lay out a positive vision for improving government, rather than engaging in bureaucrat bashing."

According to the Election Day survey, support for the government and for federal employees is evenly spread across party and ideological lines.

Voters were asked to choose between candidates who "complained about the role of bureaucrats in government and blamed them for what is wrong with government" and others who "said we need a positive vision of how to make government more effective and that the blame for government doesn't lie with federal workers but with elected leaders."

More than half of all voters surveyed, 52 percent, said they agreed that the nation needs a positive vision of government, and they refused to blame workers for government's failings. More than a quarter of those surveyed, 27 percent, said they believed any fault lay with "bureaucrats."

The survey of 1,000 voters was conducted by telephone on Nov. 2. The results have a 3 percent margin of error.

The majority of respondents in all demographic categories said they blame elected officials-not bureaucrats-for government problems. Some categories, however, showed more disparate results than others. For Democrats, 60 percent of respondents favored a positive image of government and only 19 percent blamed bureaucrats. Among Republican voters, 43 percent said the country needs a positive image of government while 34 percent said federal workers are to blame for government failings.

There was no significant difference in results between age groups, genders or regions of the country.

A majority of voters also said they believe that "improving the federal workforce" is vital "to winning the war on terror," according to the partnership release.