62% of Canadians and 51% of Americans personally believe global warming is a “major crisis.”
Vancouver, BC [June 26, 2020] – Most Canadians and Americans would consent to providing larger fiscal contributions to their governments in order to combat global warming, a new two-country Research Co. poll has found.
In the online survey of representative national samples, 60% of Canadians and 54% of Americans say they are willing to pay higher taxes in order to adequately deal with climate change.
More than three-in-five Canadians (64%) and a majority of Americans (53%) believe global warming is a fact and is mostly caused by emissions from vehicles and industrial facilities.
About one-in-four respondents in the two countries (23% in Canada and 25% in the United States) think climate change is a fact and is mostly caused by natural changes.
Only 7% of Canadians and 14% of Americans believe global warming is a theory that has not yet been proven—including 12% of Conservative Party voters in the 2019 Canadian federal election and 26% of Republican Party supporters in the United States.
About three-in-five Canadians (62%) and half of Americans (51%) describe global warming as a “major crisis”, including 70% of those aged 18-to-34 in Canada and 54% of those aged 55 and over in the United States.
When asked about specific actions that could be taken now to deal with climate change, most Canadians and Americans feel companies and corporations (75% and 59% respectively), governments (69% and 56%) and individuals and consumers (64% and 55%) should be doing more.
Residents of both countries are also supportive of actions to mitigate climate change in the future from companies and corporations (76% in Canada and 61% in the United States), governments (71% and 58%) and individuals and consumers (66% and 55%).
Parents of children under the age of 18 were asked about the effect of conversations about climate change with their kids. Two thirds of Canadian parents (67%) and more than half of American parents (54%) say they are recycling more after chatting with their children about climate change.
Smaller proportions of parents in Canada and the United States say they are driving less than usual (38% and 32% respectively) and taking shorter showers (34% and 31%) after chatting with their kids about global warming.
Methodology:
Results are based on online studies conducted from June 1 to June 3, 2020, among representative samples of 1,000 adults Canada and the United States. The data has been statistically weighted according to Canadian and U.S. census figures for age, gender and region in each country. The margin of error—which measures sample variability—is +/- 3.1 percentage points for each country.
Find our full Canadian dataset here, our full American dataset here and download the press release here.
For more information on this poll, please contact:
Mario Canseco, President, Research Co.
778.929.0490
[e] mario.canseco@researchco.ca