Corporate corruption is big US voter worry—poll

BOSTON—With less than two months to go before the US presidential election, a new survey found 61 per cent of Americans say a candidate’s commitment to rooting out corporate wrongdoing will be key in deciding who gets their vote. Along with keen interest in knowing each candidate’s plans to fix the struggling economy, voters want government to do more to fight corporate misconduct, which they say helped cause the financial crisis.

“In these difficult economic times, Americans are mad as hell about corporate wrongdoing and are going to do something about it in the November elections and beyond,” said Jordan Thomas, a partner at law firm Labaton Sucharow, which commissioned the survey and which represents corporate whistleblowers. A telephone poll of 1,015 people conducted from August 16-19 found that 64 per cent of Americans said corporate misconduct helped bring about the current economic crisis.

And 81 per cent of respondents said the government has not done enough to stop corporate wrongdoing. Republican candidate Mitt Romney, who made a fortune running private equity firm Bain Capital and served as governor of Massachusetts, is campaigning to replace Democrat Barack Obama as president in what pollsters are calling a very tight presidential race.

Voters have been outraged by disclosures that banks forged documents to foreclose on homeowners, financial firms packaged risky mortgages into bonds that were improperly rated triple-A, and international banks manipulated Libor, a key international lending rate. The survey’s release coincides with the first anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street protest movement.

Reuters