WASHINGTON — Voters cannot split President Obama and Mitt Romney as to who is best to fix the economy.
Overall Obama leads Romney, the presumptive GOP nominee, by 49 percent to 46 percent when voters were asked who they would vote for. But asked who can handle the economy, both scored 47 percent, a new Washington Post/ABC poll out Tuesday found.
More than half of those asked said the economy was the number one issue going into the November election.
A majority of Americans — 54 percent — also said they are more hopeful than anxious about the situation over the next few years when it comes to the economy.
Obama must overcome the opinions of many who think he has failed to improve the economy at all, with his numbers on the issue comparable to George H. W. Bush, who lost his bid for re-election in 1992 amid a flagging economy.
Asked where they stand financially compared with when Obama took office in January 2009, 30 percent said they were worse off and only 16 percent said they were better off.
Obama fared better than Romney on the question of who better understands people’s economic problems — 48 percent to 40 percent.
Obama was also ahead of the former Massachusetts governor — 47 percent to 43 percent — as to who better represents their values and who is more likely to stand up for what they believe in, by 51 percent to 38 percent.
The telephone poll was conducted May 17-20 among a random sample of 1,004 adults with a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points.