Indicator: Satisfaction With State Government

Outcome (s): Communities capable of meeting the needs of children and families in all of their diversity.

Why This is Important

Value of services for amount of money paid (in this case, taxes) is a good measure of efficiency. People’s perception of the efficiency of state government is an important component of their satisfaction with government, and satisfaction with government is important to foster economic growth.

Where We Stand

*For 2005, data is being collected differently for this indicator. For the years 2001 and 2004, this question was asked specifically to those with children in the household under the age of 18. Those results are still presented in the chart with an asterisk*. Previous to 2001, this indicator was part of the annual report from the Maine Development Foundation – Measures of Growth. For 2005, this indicator is once again similar to the earlier indicators as the intention is to once again provide a more broad based measure that may tell a story that calls attention to all parts of our communities. This year the question was
added to a bi-annual Tracking Survey © conducted by Critical Insights, a market research firm in Portland, Maine. This survey targets a more broad population of adult residents in Maine.

On this indicator, respondents are asked, “How do you rate the value of Maine State government services that you get for the taxes you pay to the State?” For 2005, 13% of these respondents rated the value of State services as either “very good” or “excellent” while 53% rated the value of State services as “fair” or “poor”. 31% rated the services as“good”. Comparing to earlier trends, a 44% rating combining “good/very good/excellent” in 2005 is similar to the past in that a positive rating, more than 50%, has never occurred on this type of indicator.

Data Source and Context

As mentioned above, for 2005 this indicator has a different data source. These respondents are not exclusively households with children ages 18 and younger. This indicator was the results of a purchased item (question) that was part of the Tracking Survey © conducted by Critical Insights one of their bi-annual survey efforts in November 2005. This public opinion survey had 601 respondents with only 30% of all respondents having children ages 18 and younger in the household.

Respondents were asked: “How would you rate the value of Maine State government services that you get for the taxes you pay the State?”