It’s Thursday, August 27. This is The Front Page, your daily window into the world of The Free Press—and our take on the world at large. Today: Why Meta’s $18 billion social media settlement should be only the beginning. Was mass incarceration a myth? The woman behind the AI bot-turned-sorority star. And much more.
But first: Is America losing faith in capitalism?
As this year’s primary elections draw to a close, one question has loomed above all others: What is America’s ideal economic system? Over the past several weeks, members of the Democratic Socialists of America have scored victories from New York and Pennsylvania to Colorado and Florida, challenging the country’s long-standing faith in the capitalist system in a way rarely seen before.
But just how widespread are these sentiments? Is this socialist fervor reflective of a broader shift in Americans’ economic views—or something more limited to the fringe left?
That’s the big question we posed in the latest edition of The Honesty Project, our partnership with Populace, an opinion-research think tank that designs surveys to capture respondents’ “private” opinions—the views they may consider too sensitive to share publicly.
Today’s results suggest that while most Americans remain wary of full-blown socialism (with some notable exceptions), just one in three Americans have a positive view of capitalism.
That’s a striking finding in a country whose economic system has long been rooted in free enterprise—and it’s just the beginning of what the poll reveals. Today, Mene Ukueberuwa dives into these findings, and reports on where Americans are on one of the most consequential issues in politics.
—The Editors
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