#8 - RW 3-18-05 - RW Home
RUSSIANS' ATTITUDE TOWARDS BENEFITS REFORM IMPROVES

MOSCOW, March 16 (RIA Novosti) - The attitude of Russians towards the law replacing the benefits with money payments has been improved since mid-January. The number of those who holds no grudge against either the law or those implementing it has grown from 13% to 24%. Still, the number of those believing the law is not bad in itself but its implementation is has dropped from 37% to 32%, as did the number of those thinking the law had been conceived as a means to "fleece the population" - from 38% to 35%.

The VTsIOM polling agency disseminated the data on Wednesday. They were obtained in a representative polling of 1,600 Russian nationals on March 5-6 in 100 locations in 40 Russian region and republics. The statistical error is within 3.4%.

Interestingly, over less than two months, the number of respondents claiming they and their families have no benefits has risen by 1.5 times. The number of the people expecting deterioration of their living standards due to the benefits reform diminished from 38% to 31%.

The opinion prevails that protests against the reform will be futile and cease soon, with the number of such respondents increasing from 32% to 42% from early February to early March. The number of the Russians expecting a revision of the law has reduced from 27% to 21%, as did the number of respondents thinking that the protests can result in the government's resignation.

Over the past month, the number of those believing that protests were possible dropped from 53% to 49% while the number of respondents deeming them unlikely has grown from 42% to 48%.