Survey: Fewer trust government

LONDON - Trust in elected leaders has fallen sharply, a global survey said Monday, citing the protracted budget battle in Washington that nearly saw the U.S. default on its debts and Europe's stuttering response to its debt crisis as key reasons.

Ahead of this week's World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the public-relations firm Edelman said only 44 percent of university-educated people participating in the survey trusted government, down 4 percentage points from the previous year. As recently as 2011, trust in politicians stood at 52 percent.

The 2014 Edelman Trust Barometer found the largest gap in its 14-year history, 14 points, between trust in government and trust in business.

"This is a profound evolution in the landscape of trust from 2009, where business had to partner with government to regain trust," the agency's CEO, Richard Edelman, said.

The United States experienced a 16 percentage point fall in the level of political trust to 37 percent, which Edelman attributed to factors including Congress' debt-ceiling standoff, revelations of widespread snooping by the National Security Agency, and a calamitous start to the health-care reform website.

In Europe, the numbers were similarly dispiriting for elected leaders. In France, where there is growing concern over the inability of President Francois Hollande's government to get the economy going, only 32 percent of respondents said they trust government, down 17 percentage points.

Yet business leaders should not be too relieved, Edelman cautioned.

Even though overall trust in business held steady at 58 percent, the survey found that of the eight groups it monitored, only government officials were trusted less than CEOs, and both groups were the only ones distrusted by a majority of respondents.

According to the survey, 84 percent of respondents believed that business can pursue its own interest while doing work that promotes society as a whole. Edelman said, however, that business should not view that as an opportunity to push for more deregulation, a move that many blame for causing the 2008 financial crisis.

Concerns over business' ability to regulate itself have been renewed by the $13 billion record fine for JP Morgan Chase.

The online survey queried 27,000 people in 27 countries. It was conducted between Oct. 16 and Nov. 29, 2013.