An overwhelming majority of Americans say the United States will likely go into a recession in the next year, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday.
Forty-five percent of Americans call a recession "very likely," while 40 percent say it's "somewhat likely," adding up to a whopping 85 percent. Only 12 percent say it is "not so likely" or "not likely at all."
"Americans believe a recession is not a mere threat, it's a looming reality," Quinnipiac polling analyst Tim Malloy said Wednesday.
On the same day Quinnipiac released the poll, the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 1,100 points, its biggest drop since June 2020.
Eighty percent, meanwhile, said the state of the economy is either "not so good" or poor, which is "Americans' most negative description" since President Joe Biden took office.
Americans' recession fears seem to be leading them to vote Republican, the poll found. Forty-seven percent of voters, a plurality, want Republicans to win control of the House, a 2-point increase since April. An even larger plurality, 48 percent, want Republicans to win control of the Senate, a 4-point increase since April.
The poll has even more bad news for Biden. A majority of Americans, 67 percent, say the president has at least some control over inflation, which since December has stayed at 40-year highs. Gas prices, meanwhile, on Tuesday broke records for the third time just this year. Liberal economists, including Obama administration advisers Steven Rattner and Lawrence Summers, have blamed Biden's policies for skyrocketing inflation.
Only 35 percent of Americans approve of Biden's performance, a 3-point drop since April, the poll also found. Fifty-seven percent disapprove.