Moon Jae-in's Government Approval Rating Rises to 44%... Negative Ratings Fall Below 50% [Gallup]

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Kang Nahum] President Moon Jae-in's approval rating for his administration has risen according to both Realmeter and Korea Gallup surveys.

Gallup announced on the 6th that in a public opinion survey conducted from the 3rd to the 5th among 1,000 adults aged 18 and over, 44% of respondents gave a positive evaluation of President Moon's job performance. This figure is up 2 percentage points from the previous week. On the other hand, negative evaluations fell by 3 percentage points to 48%.

By age group, the positive/negative ratings were 40%/48% for ages 18-29 (hereafter '20s'), 54%/41% for 30s, 55%/38% for 40s, 44%/51% for 50s, and 32%/56% for those aged 60 and above.

By political party support, 89% of the Democratic Party of Korea supporters and 69% of Justice Party supporters evaluated the president's job performance positively, but 92% of United Future Party supporters were negative, and among those without party affiliation (no party), negative views were also more prevalent (positive 19%, negative 61%).

When asked the reasons for positive evaluations from those who approved of the president's job performance (438 respondents), the responses were 'response to the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19)' (37%), 'doing their best/working hard' (15%), 'overall good performance' (6%), 'honesty/frankness/transparency' (5%), followed by 'welfare expansion' and 'efforts for ordinary people' (both 3%).

Reasons for negative evaluations (476 respondents) included 'inadequate response to COVID-19' (50%), 'lack of solutions to economic and livelihood issues' and 'overall insufficiency' (both 8%), 'diplomatic issues' and 'authoritarian/unilateral/biased' (both 4%), as well as 'untrustworthy/unfavorable', 'focus on North Korea relations/pro-North Korea tendencies', and 'lack of communication' (all 3%).

Notably, responses related to COVID-19 increased on both the positive and negative sides compared to the previous week. Gallup explained, "This shows that contrasting views on the government's COVID-19 response have become more acute."

Party support was 36% for the Democratic Party of Korea, 22% for the United Future Party, 6% for the Justice Party, 2% for the People's Party, and 1% each for the Minsheng Party, Minjung Party, and Uri Gonghwa Party.

Most parties showed differences within 1 percentage point from the previous week, indicating no significant change in the overall party landscape.

This survey contacted 6,853 adult men and women nationwide aged 18 and over, with a final 1,000 respondents completing the survey, resulting in a 15% response rate. The sampling error is ±3.1 percentage points at a 95% confidence level. For more details, refer to the Central Election Survey Deliberation Commission website.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.