One of the great things about Houston.
Housing costs and the economy topped Houstonians’ concerns this year in the 42nd annual Kinder Houston Area Survey, which also showed a coalescing desire to close the income gap as residents reported widening disparities in their financial outlooks.
While some issues remain nationally divisive, that isn’t always the case in Houston. Ruth López Turley, director of Rice University’s Kinder Institute for Urban Research, said she is hopeful as locals have increasingly reached consensus on a variety of economic and social issues.
“On the one hand, the inequalities are persistent. On the other hand, I find it very hopeful that now a majority, a large majority, want that to change,” López Turley said. “We haven’t seen any action taken, really, but the fact that more people want to see action taken, that’s the first step.”
[…]
The Houston area is also becoming more socially liberal, with younger population driving the direction of public opinion, researchers said.
The number of people who support the right to abortion has remained largely unchanged over the years – 56 percent in 1988 and 59 percent in 2023 – but beliefs on morality are changing. Houstonians felt abortion was “morally wrong” through the 2010s, but the answer split evenly in 2021.
This year, 58 percent said abortion was morally right and 42 percent said it was morally wrong, with older people were more likely to feel it was wrong.
Around 90 percent of the panel’s respondents supported abortion in cases where woman’s health at risk, and 80 percent supported the right to abortion when a serious birth defect is detected, according to the survey results.
People also support gun rights with restrictions – 76 percent said it is very important or somewhat important to protect the Second Amendment, but more than 81 percent favored federal laws requiring handgun registration. Another 93 percent supported universal background checks regardless of where a firearm is purchased. And two-thirds said they find it “very important” to control gun ownership.
Houstonians who were surveyed also overwhelmingly support providing pathways toward legal citizenship for individuals living in the U.S. without documentation, at 80 percent. About 70 percent say immigrants strengthen American culture rather than threaten it, and the share reporting that immigrants contribute more to the economy than they take out has grown from 42 percent in 1994 to 71 percent in 2023.
There’s more, so read the rest of the story and read the survey itself. The Kinder Houston Area Survey is a huge asset to Houston and we should be really grateful to have it. The Press has more.