Gallup: Americans All Over the Map on Which Issues Matter Most

An average of Gallup polling on issues that matter most to Americans found little agreement on the worst problem facing the United States.

For the first time since 2001, no one issue averaged 20 percent or more mentions from poll respondents as the most pressing issue plaguing the country.

Even in a year when ISIS declared its caliphate across large swaths of Iraq and Syria, and beheaded three Americans, terrorism and national security stayed in the low single digits. In 2002, terrorism was the top issue with a 24 percent average over the year.

General discontent with government, from the executive to the legislative branches, took the top spot over the course of the year.

Immigration peaked at 17 percent during July, when floods of unaccompanied illegal immigrant children were coming across the border.

Since President Obama came into office, the economy and unemployment have taken top billing in most of the years’ Gallup surveys.

“The dispersion of public concern seen in 2014 may also have implications for the 2016 presidential election,” Gallup said in this year’s assessment. “Should it persist, the lack of a single defining public issue could make candidates’ task of honing a message for the election more complex.”