New Coke, the sweeter reformulation of Coca-Cola that the company launched in the 1980s, is remembered as a failure of market research or at least, of the interpretation of market research. Surveys in advance, focus groups and taste tests preferred the new version of Coke. When it actually launched there was a negative backlash. People didn’t like their Coke being messed with and Coca-Cola eventually reversed and went back to the old formula. It’s a classic example of how a product that tests well in the artificial environment of a survey or taste test doesn’t necessarily perform the same way “in the wild”, when subject to the full chaotic system of public opinion.

This isn’t going to be a post about Coca-Cola market research strategy in the 1980s – I am sure it was far more complicated than the myths that have grown up about it – rather this polling from YouGov for the Times about NHS spending. At the weekend some of the papers reported that Labour were considering an increase in National Insurance contributions to help fund the NHS. YouGov asked people directly about this – would they like to see the basic level of National Insurance go up from 12p to 13p to help fund the NHS – indeed, people would, by 48% to 37%.

Politicians have in the past tended to use National Insurance as a rise that is less noticeable to the public than income tax, even though for salaried employees it is much the same thing (obviously it has different thresholds, but it’s still essentially an extra 1% of your salary deducted at source). I was a little cynical about that – did it really work, or do people treat it just the same? Or even, would people prefer the honesty of an income tax rise? YouGov asked the same question using a rise in the basic rate of income tax. Funded from income tax its the other way around, 34% support it, 51% are opposed. It looks as it the ruse works – if the extra 1% of people’s wages is labelled a NI rise, people support it. If it’s labelled an income tax rise, people oppose it.

Of course there are technical differences between NI and income tax (the way it affects the self-employed, or isn’t paid by pensioners, or is paid by people on lower pay than income tax is) and in theory they could contribute to the difference. I suspect most of the answer is simply that people are more aware of income tax and how it works and understand national insurance less well. Hence they are less supportive of a tax rise when they understand exactly how they’ll be paying it.

To bring it back to the New Coke analogy though, what does the question tell us about the policy? Would it be a popular thing for Labour to promise? Well, I think it tells us there’s a risk there. If support for a tax rise is conditional upon people not understanding it very well it does pose the question of what would happen if they had it explained to them, or even “misexplained” to them (remember how a National Insurance rise was packaged up as a “Labour jobs tax” by the Tories before the last election?). Essentially people like spending more on the NHS, they generally dislike paying more taxes (YouGov also asked if people would support keeping income tax, NI and health spending the same – people supported that too!). In the artificial scenario of a polling question you can link those two things and force people to consider them as one, you can use a form of tax people answering the question aren’t so familiar with. If it was an actual party policy, it would be out there being debated by parties, reported by the media, discussed in the pub. Would it be a discussion about how Labour are willing to make the hard but necessary decisions on providing the funding for the future of the NHS? Or would it be a discussion about how Labour would be putting up ordinary people’s taxes? Until a policy goes out into the wild that’s not an easy question to answer.

This week’s YouGov results for the Sunday Times are now up here.

The topline voting intention figures are CON 35%, LAB 41%, LDEM 9%, UKIP 7%. The six point Labour lead is unusual, typically YouGov have been showing Labour leads of around 9-10 points for the last few months. In the absence of any big announcements or developments that could explain a big drop, I would urge caution… sure, it could be the sign of some Conservative recovery, but just as likely it is random sample error. The rest of the survey concentrates on the economy, wealth taxes, Nick Clegg, Heathrow and honours.

28% of people think the government’s economic policy is basically right (including almost three-quarters of Tory supporters), 56% think it is basically wrong. People unhappy with the current strategy though are divided over what changes they would make – 24% of them would like bigger spending cuts to fund tax cuts, 21% would like the opposite – tax increases to reduce spending cuts. 17% would like more short-term borrowing to reduce spending cuts, 4% would like more short-term borrowing to fund tax cuts. 35% say they would like something else or that they don’t know.

Turning to the question of a wealth tax, 57% of people support the principle of such a tax, with 29% opposed. The most popular cut off point for a wealth tax is £1 million (supported by 34%). 19% would support a lower threshold than this, 35% a higher one. There is a noticable regional pattern here, with people in London much more likely to oppose a wealth tax and supporting higher thresholds if there is one.

Arguments about taxes on the rich damaging the country do not have much cut through. While 66% people think that there is some risk that high taxes on the wealthy will drive them abroad, two-thirds of them still think it is the right thing to do under the present circumstances. 48% of people think that higher taxes on the rich will raise more money even taking into account this risk (31% disagree). Overall 39% of people think higher taxes on the wealthy would help an economic recovery compared to 18% who think it would damage the chances of an economic recovery (31% think it will make no real difference).

Moving onto questions about Nick Clegg, 17% of people see him as an asset to the government compared to 58% who think he is a liability. These figures are almost identical to George Osborne (16% asset, 58% liability) putting the two of them as the lowest rated of the politicians YouGov asked about. The most positively rated by some distance was William Hague – 43% of people think he is an asset, compared to 29% who think he is a liability.

30% of people say that Clegg should remain as leader, compared to 40% who think he should be replaced. However, asked whether they think the Liberal Democrats would do better at the next election if they keep Clegg or replace him only 18% think they’d do better with Clegg, compared to 53% who think they would do better if they changed. Amongst the Liberal Democrat party’s own supporters 60% think that the party should keep Nick Clegg… but only 31% think that the party would do better with Clegg at the next election. 47% of Lib Dem supporters think they would do better with someone else.

Amongst those who think the Lib Dems would do better if they changed 28% think they would do best under Vince Cable, far above all the other Lib Dem politicians in the question but less than those who said None or Don’t know (43%). A significant part of questions like this are simple name recognition – Vince is a very well known politician, while other serious contenders like Tim Farron are very little known outside the circles of we political anoraks!

Turning to the subject of Heathrow, 35% of people support Heathrow expansion, 32% oppose it and 33% don’t know. However, when asked specifically about whether David Cameron should keep his manifesto pledge on Heathrow only 19% of people think he should break it and go ahead with Heathrow expansion. 35% think he should rule it out and 32% think he should reconsider the issue at the next election.

Finally on the honours systems, people think too many awards go to figures from entertainment (69% too many), senior civil servants (61% too many), national politicians (67% too many), local politicians (48% too many), sportsmen and women (39% too many) and business leaders (37% too many). They would like to see more awards go to people from charities (71% not enough), scientists and academics (64% not enough) and people working in the public services (66% not enough).

A version of this post also appears on the YouGov website here

Ahead of the budget tomorrow here’s a round up of the various questions that YouGov have asked about the budget in recent weeks, mostly in the YouGov/Sunday Times polls.

The budget comes under a background of deep public pessimism about the state of the economy. Only 4% of British people think the economy is in a good state, compared to 75% who think it is in a bad condition. Only 10% expect their financial position to get better over the next year. The government’s cuts are unpopular, are still seem as unfair by 60% of people, too deep by 45%, too fast by 50% and bad for the economy by 49%. However, the public have largely accepted the government’s argument that they are necessary (55% agree) and that they are largely the fault of the last Labour government (63% blame the last Labour government compared to 51% for the current government, including 27% who blame both).

The coalition are still trusted more than Labour on the economy by 32% to 26%, and the public are fairly evenly split on the government’s economic strategy. 38% think they should stick to their present strategy of prioritising deficit reduction, even if this means growth is low. 34% would prefer them to prioritise growth, even if this means the deficit stays longer or gets worse.

If George Osborne has money to spend in the budget though, the public would like his first priorities to be cutting living costs for those struggling (31%) and cutting taxes for those struggling (21%).

50p tax rate and taxing the wealthy
YouGov’s polling has consistently shown widespread opposition to the abolition of the 50p rate, with only 27% supporting the abolition of the 50p tax rate.
Support for the 50p rate would not be much diminished even if it was shown that it was not raising much money, one of the arguments that has been made for its abolition. Asked what should happen if it was shown the tax was not raising extra money, 41% of people would support its abolition, but 40% would still want to retain it anyway for moral reasons.

One idea that has been suggested is to replace the 50p tax rate with an alternative tax on the wealthy, with a common suggestion being a mansion tax. Our polls have shown that a mansion tax on property worth more than £2million is popular in its own right – supported by 75% of respondents including 68% of Conservative voters. While the 50p tax rate was seen as both a fairer and a more effective way of getting wealthy people to pay more in taxation, people were evenly split on the idea of replacing the 50p tax rate with a mansion tax – 34% would support the replacement, 37% would oppose it.

Another suggestion has been to remove higher rate tax relief on pension contributions. YouGov’s polls suggest a broadly even split on this, with 38% of people supporting the abolition, 37% opposing it.

Personal tax allowance
There is wide public support for an increase in the personal tax allowance to £10,000. 90% of respondents would support an increase in the allowance to £10,000.

Polls on tax, however, will almost always find support for a cut if the question doesn’t ask them to balance the cut against how it might be paid for. In this case though there is still majority support for an increase to £10,000 or more if respondents are prompted to consider the need to balance an increase in the personal tax allowance with tax hikes, spending cuts or more borrowing – 54% would still support an increase in the personal tax allowance to £10,000 or more.

Fuel duty
A cut in fuel duty remains overwhelming popular. 77% of respondents would support a decrease in the level of fuel duty on petrol and diesel, 16% think it should be kept the same with only 4% supporting a rise. Asked to pick priorities for tax cuts, a reduction in fuel duty came top on 34%, making it more popular than an increase in personal tax allowance (31%) or a cut in VAT (23%).

Asked to balance the need to cut the deficit against their support for lower fuel taxes, 59% of people think it is more important to cut fuel taxes than it is to cut the deficit, compared to 20% who think that the state of the economy means it is more important to reduce the size of the deficit.

Child benefit
There have been some suggestions that George Osborne will take measures to soften the planned withdrawal of child benefit from households with a higher rate taxpayer. Our polling shows 61% support the existing plans to withdraw child benefit, compared to 27% who oppose the move. However, there is a widespread perception that the proposed arrangements, whereby a family with a single higher rate taxpayer could lose the benefit despite earning less than a family with two basic rate taxpayers that would keep the benefit. Only 24% of respondents think this is fair.

Tables
YouGov/Sunday Times(17th Feb)
YouGov/Sun on Sunday (24th Feb)
YouGov/Sunday Times(26th Feb)
YouGov/Sunday Times (2nd Mar)
YouGov/Sunday Times(9th Mar)
YouGov/Sunday Times(16th Mar)
YouGov/Sun (19th March)