the second group was immediately told the correct percentage the [federal] government spends on welfare (1 percent)
If the researchers reported "1 percent" as the actual federal government spending on welfare programs, they were themselves misleading people in the service of an agenda, perhaps by using an incredibly narrow legalistic definition of "welfare".
For 2009, Wikipedia reports $3.1 trillion in US federal expenditures. $224 billion, about 7%, went to Medicaid and SCHIP -- medical assistance to lower-income people -- which would fall under a common, casual definition of 'welfare'. Another $360 billion -- over 11%, went to a category Wikipedia calls "Unemployment/Welfare/Other mandatory spending", which appears to include ~$40 billion in unemployment compensation, at least $100 billion in "other income security", and $100 billion in food and housing assistance. Again, most people would consider most or all of this spending 'welfare'.
Even Social Security and Medicare -- as they often subsidize the spending of people with more money than they've paid in, especially low-income people -- have at least some component that would be fair to consider 'welfare'. Together, they are over $1.3 trillion of the federal budget -- more than 40%.
A plain English definition of 'welfare' from Princeton's WordNet is "governmental provision of economic assistance to persons in need". From the items listed above, one could easily make the case 15%-40% of the federal budget fits that definition.
And this is without even going into subsidies for the middle-class and corporations -- the home mortgage interest tax deduction, cash-for-clunkers, financial bailouts, farm subsidies -- which are also economic assistance, and ostensibly justified because the recipients are said to have some pressing need, and sometimes archly labeled 'welfare'.
(While I've used 2009 numbers, the 1999/2000 numbers -- when the Kuklinski UIUC study was published -- aren't that different in overall proportions. The respondents -- with their more-common answers of 5%/8%/11%/15% -- were all closer to the real values than the researchers' preferred 1% answer.)
Sure, the classification of Social Security is arguable. That's why I listed the things that almost everyone would agree are 'welfare' -- approaching 18% of the 2009 federal budget -- before going into things that many would not consider 'welfare', or would only consider partially 'welfare' (like Social Security and Medicare).
FYI, food assistance alone is over 1% of recent federal budgets. Food assistance is definitely welfare spending, right?
Digging up the actual paper [1] for the study didn't give me any more confidence it showed much of anything other than the researchers' biases. They don't list the exact questions they asked in their telephone quiz of about 300 people, but if they were worded anything like the headings of their graphs -- "Percent Budget that Goes to Welfare", "Respondent's Factual Estimate" -- then all the responses they categorized as wrong were closer to the actual value than their preferred "1%" answer. And, phone surveys are known to be incredibly sensitive to tiny changes in wording and presentation ordering. You could easily nudge people to be more right, or more wrong -- depending on your desired result.
They do quote the question they asked a smaller different group of 64 students: "From zero to 100 percent, what percent of the national budget do you think is spent on welfare?" Defending on your preferred definition, I think a reasonable person could correctly answer anything from as low as 8% to as high as 60%. But the researchers then told the subjects the true number was 1% to see what effect that had on the students' policy preferences. To me, that's just like a dishonest 'push poll'.
And then they wonder why people resist changing their beliefs when presented with new 'facts' like the wrong 1% number! People have been battered by researchers twisting numbers in the service of agendas for so long, sticking to prior ideas is an adaptive defense.
I think very few people would consider Social Security part of "welfare."
Okay, so now we have an illustration of mass irrationality in the political system. Looking at how Social Security is funded and distributed fits typical definitions of a welfare program.
Looking at how Social Security is funded and distributed fits typical definitions of a welfare program.
I disagree. Typical definitions of a welfare program have money going to poor people as a central feature. That doesn't describe Social Security.
Social Security pays a disproportionate amount to those who are well off. There are two factors. The amount you get paid out depends on how much you put in, and your life span. People who are better off generally wind up paying in more, and then live longer to collect benefits. Overall Social Security represents a wealth transfer from young to old, and from the poor to the top 20% of the population.
Oh right, and in recent decades it has been a net source of working revenue for the federal government, through the form of buying Treasury bonds. But now it is considered broken because the federal government does not have any way to pay back to Social Security money that is owed it from general funds...
Social Security pays a disproportionate amount to those who are well off.
I agree with this criticism of Social Security and this basis for saying that Social Security is distinct from welfare. The reason I tend to regard Social Security as a welfare program is that it is, I think by general agreement, an ENTITLEMENT program, in other words a program that a subsidized recipient can draw from with only minimal reference to individual characteristics of the recipient. (You disagree with me on that point, in part, but the degree to which Social Security payments to recipients are linked to taxpayer "contributions" to a Social Security account is only partial, not on exact actuarial principles.)
Well obviously Social Security is an entitlement program. So is Veterans Benefits and Services. That doesn't make either welfare.
Anyways most of this is a terminology argument. You're defining welfare broadly as any government spending for the purpose of helping (mostly poor) people. The researchers defined welfare narrowly as the federal government's contribution towards the cost of sending people welfare checks. (That would be money spent on TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families).) Reasonable arguments can be formulated for either definition. The fact that they use a more narrow and technical definition doesn't make their definition wrong. Nor does it indicate any dishonesty on their part.
If the researchers reported "1 percent" as the actual federal government spending on welfare programs, they were themselves misleading people in the service of an agenda, perhaps by using an incredibly narrow legalistic definition of "welfare".
For 2009, Wikipedia reports $3.1 trillion in US federal expenditures. $224 billion, about 7%, went to Medicaid and SCHIP -- medical assistance to lower-income people -- which would fall under a common, casual definition of 'welfare'. Another $360 billion -- over 11%, went to a category Wikipedia calls "Unemployment/Welfare/Other mandatory spending", which appears to include ~$40 billion in unemployment compensation, at least $100 billion in "other income security", and $100 billion in food and housing assistance. Again, most people would consider most or all of this spending 'welfare'.
Even Social Security and Medicare -- as they often subsidize the spending of people with more money than they've paid in, especially low-income people -- have at least some component that would be fair to consider 'welfare'. Together, they are over $1.3 trillion of the federal budget -- more than 40%.
A plain English definition of 'welfare' from Princeton's WordNet is "governmental provision of economic assistance to persons in need". From the items listed above, one could easily make the case 15%-40% of the federal budget fits that definition.
And this is without even going into subsidies for the middle-class and corporations -- the home mortgage interest tax deduction, cash-for-clunkers, financial bailouts, farm subsidies -- which are also economic assistance, and ostensibly justified because the recipients are said to have some pressing need, and sometimes archly labeled 'welfare'.
(While I've used 2009 numbers, the 1999/2000 numbers -- when the Kuklinski UIUC study was published -- aren't that different in overall proportions. The respondents -- with their more-common answers of 5%/8%/11%/15% -- were all closer to the real values than the researchers' preferred 1% answer.)