Q. Do you agree or disagree with the following statements about the Federal budget?
| Total agree | Total disagree | Strongly agree | Agree | Disagree | Strongly disagree | Don’t know | 2017 agree | 2017 disagree | |
| Overall, the budget is fair and balanced | 46% | 38% | 6% | 40% | 25% | 13% | 16% | 43% | 38% |
| This budget does not do enough to reduce the deficit | 56% | 24% | 15% | 41% | 20% | 4% | 20% | 41% | 31% |
| This was the budget Australia needs at this time | 39% | 42% | 7% | 32% | 28% | 14% | 19% | 39% | 36% |
| This budget will benefit the wealthy more than ordinary Australians and make Australia a more unfair society | 54% | 27% | 21% | 33% | 21% | 6% | 19% | – | – |
| This budget is more about improving the Government’s popularity than improving the economy | 62% | 21% | 25% | 37% | 17% | 4% | 16% | 51% | 27% |
There was majority agreement that the budget is more about improving the Government’s popularity than improving the economy (62% agree), the budget does not do enough to reduce the deficit (56%) and the budget will benefit the wealthy more than ordinary Australians (54%)
The least widely agreed with statement was that this was the budget Australia needs at this time, with 39% agree/42% disagree.
Compared to responses to last year’s budget, respondents were more likely to think this budget does not do enough to reduce the deficit (up 15% to 56%) and the budget is more about improving the Government’s popularity than improving the economy (up 11% to 62%).
There was little difference between the 2017 and 2018 budgets in terms of being “fair and balanced”