May 17, 2016
Do people with higher credit scores tend to see foreign policy and defense spending as more important than economic issues like unemployment and the cost of higher education? A survey of over 1,000 Credit Karma members indicates that might be the case.
In late March and early April, we asked a group of our 50 million members to rate 14 issues on a five-point scale ranging from “not at all important” to “extremely important.” We compared the credit scores* of the respondents with their answers and found that an individual’s credit score can say a lot about what issues matter to them and how that might impact their vote in the presidential election. After finding a surprising amount of agreement among people across the credit score spectrum on healthcare and Social Security as priorities, the emphasis changes depending on credit score.
Credit Karma members with lower credit scores more frequently said economic issues like unemployment, cost of higher education and wealth inequality were very important or extremely important. Respondents with higher credit scores instead marked foreign policy issues as very important or extremely important.
We also found:
● Seven out of ten Credit Karma members with a credit score under 700 said unemployment was very important or extremely important to them, a rate that put the issue second only to taxes.
● Less than two-thirds of respondents (62%) with credit scores between 700 and 749 said unemployment was very important or extremely important. Among these members, immigration, defense spending and foreign policy were more important.
● For Credit Karma members with credit scores above 750, only 55% ranked unemployment as very important or extremely important.
● Those with the highest credit scores (700 and above) ranked foreign policy and defense spending as very important or extremely important more often than those with lower credit scores.
● Three-quarters of respondents with credit scores above 640 said immigration was either extremely important or very important compared to two-thirds of those with scores below 640.
● While taxes ended up as one of the top three most important issues for an overwhelming majority of members, the percentage of people who ranked it extremely important or very important dropped considerably (to 73%) for those with the highest credit scores (above 750).
You can see the full election survey results here.
*Methodology
From late March to early April, Credit Karma surveyed 1,018 Credit Karma members who logged into their accounts and asked them to identify the political issues they were most likely to prioritize. Members ranked the issues on a five-point scale from “not at all important” to “extremely important.” We identified the top issues by calculating the percentage of responses in the two highest categories on the scale (“very important” and “extremely important”) and then ranking the issues by the percentage of responses in those two categories.
Credit score data is based on TransUnion VantageScore 3.0 credit scores pulled by Credit Karma members from late March to early April 2016. All data was aggregated and anonymized. Aggregate level results have a maximum 3.07% margin of error at a 95% confidence level. The survey was conducted to reflect the opinions of the U.S. demographic by percentage of participants in particular age groups in proportion to the most recent Census report. Research was conducted using the Qualtrics Insights platform.