More Americans Say Health Care for All Is Not Government's Responsibility

For the first time since Gallup began tracking the question in 2001, a new survey shows that more Americans now say it is not the federal government's responsibility to ensure health care coverage for all Americans.

Fifty percent take that position in a poll conducted Nov. 5-8, compared to 47 percent who say it is the government's responsibility. The poll's margin of error is 3 points.

In 2007, Americans said by a 69-percent-to-28-percent margin that it was government's responsibility, a number that has steadily come down since then. Gallup offered no reason for the shift or how it relates to the findings in most polls that Americans favor the health care reform proposal that would expand coverage to those who don't have it.

Seventy-seven percent of Republicans say ensuring health care coverage for all is not the government's responsibility, while 74 percent of Democrats take the opposite view.