A new poll by the Alliance for Market Solutions, as highlighted by ThinkProgress, finds overwhelming support for taking climate action. According to the poll of 800 registered voters age 18-35:
- "Nearly nine out of ten millennials (88 percent) believe climate change is happening," with 62 percent who believe (correctly) that it's being caused by human activity. Also, seven in ten millennials believe that "climate change will affect them in their lifetimes."
- 77 percent of millennials "think we should try to stop or slow climate change," with 55 percent saying we "definitely" should and 22 percent saying we "probably" should. That includes 89 percent of Democratic millennials, 77 percent of Independent millennials and 57 percent - a majority - of Republican millennials.
- Among millennials, climate change "ranked 4th as the most important issue facing the country, behind the economy/jobs (23 percent), immigration (17 percent), and health care (13 percent), but ahead of national defense (8 percent) and education (7 percent)."
- Among Republican millennials, 61 percent say they are concerned about air pollution and 51 percent about climate change.
As ThinkProgress points out, this poll is not an outlier by any means; a few weeks ago, "Gallup reported that Americans’ dissatisfaction with the quality of the environment is at an all-time high, with 45 percent saying they were satisfied with “the quality of the environment in the nation,” while 52 percent said they were dissatisfied." Finally, see this Pew poll, which finds that 75 percent of Amerians ages 18-29, and 72 percent ages 30-49, believe that we should prioritize clean energy sources like wind and solar over fossil fuels - coal, oil and natural gas. The bottom line is that younger Americans want to combat climate change and know that clean energy is a major way to do that. Let's hope politicians are listening to millennial voters.
