Data restored from a 1981 survey show that the purchases Iowans were most likely to consider were vacations, home improvements, and treasury certificates. Further, if they were given $1,000, they were most likely to save or invest it or use it to pay off debts. These data come from Iowa Poll #248, a random sample survey of 1011 Iowans from April 1981, which has been restored as part of a larger IPOL project to recover lost data from past Iowa Polls.

Iowans were asked two sets of questions. The first focused on their current financial planning: “Within the next six months, do you plan to...” with options including buying a new car, taking an out-of-state vacation, buying a house, spending $1,000 or more on home improvement, buying a new farm tractor, buying a treasury certificate or money-market certificate, buying a microwave oven, a trash compactor, a home computer system, a video recorder, a boat, a snowmobile, a new set of golf clubs, or none of the above. The most commonly chosen answers were taking a vacation (43.7%), spending $1,000 on home improvement (21.5%), and buying a treasury certificate (18.9%). Less than 10% said they would buy a car, house, tractor, microwave, computer system, video recorder, boat, or golf clubs, and no one said they would buy a snowmobile or trash compactor. Overall, 35.3% of respondents said they would not spend money on any of the items from either list. Across demographic groups, responses were generally consistent, with only minor variation.

Another question asked about how they spend unexpected income: “If you were to unexpectedly receive $1,000 today, in which ONE of the following ways would you use most of the money?” They were given the options to save or invest it, use it to pay off old debts, use it as a down payment on a major purchase, use it to buy small items, “other,” or “don’t know.” A majority (50.4%) said they would save or invest it, and 28% said they would use it to pay off old debts. The remaining 22% was fairly evenly split among using it as a down payment, buying small items, and other responses. Interestingly, when examining differences based on where people lived, only 37.8% of those living on farms said they would save or invest the money, while 40% said they would use it to pay off debts, quite different than the averages. Despite this difference, overall patterns remained broadly similar across demographic groups.

Iowa Poll #248, conducted by the Des Moines Register, was administered to a random sample of 1011 Iowans in April 1981. In addition to the question about personal spending plans, the survey asked respondents their opinions on a wide variety of topics, including the recent assassination attempt on President Reagan, foreign car manufacturing, school spending, smoking habits, and the U.S. response to a hypothetical invasion of Poland by the Soviet Union. Understanding Iowans’ past opinions on these topics can help us understand how perspectives have changed and what ideas have remained popular. IPOL has also been working with UI Libraries and the Des Moines Register to restore data from dozens of Iowa Polls from the 1960s to early 1980s. More information about the project can be found here. We are working to release a full report on our findings as we analyze additional questions.