Vote Compass: Cut health to balance budget? No way, people say

Saskatchewan might be looking at a$427-million deficit, but better to have a deficit thancuts to health and education.

That's one of the messages coming from the public in the latest report fromVote Compass,which isCBC'scitizen engagement toolfor the province election.

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The report also said people in the province aresomewhat more amenable to tax hikes and government layoffs in order to balance the budget.

In the latest round of questions, people were given various scenarios for attackingdeficits.

When asked if they supported cuts to health care, 76 per cent said no.

• Vote Compass: dealing with the deficit

The response was virtually identical when people were asked about possible cuts to education:75 per cent said that's not how they want to get out of the red.

The results were somewhat less polarized over hiking taxes. About 43 per cent said they disagreed with increasing taxes as a way to cut deficits, while 34 per cent agreed.

The findings are based on 11,657respondents whoparticipated in VoteCompass from March 7 to30.

When asked about laying off government employees, 38 per cent said they agreed with that as a way to reduce the deficit.

Vote Compass was created by Vox Pop Labs for CBC News.The online tool lets people find out where they fit on the political landscape in relation to the Saskatchewan Party, the New Democratic Party, the Liberal Party and the Green Party.

It also lets the public weigh in on issues that could come up during the campaign. The economy andhealth care have proven to be the two issues the public caresabout the most.

• Vote Compass: Try out our citizen engagement application

During the campaign, both the Saskatchewan Party and the NDP released platforms that call for deficits, at least in the short term.

Saskatchewan voters go to the polls on April 4.

About Vote Compass

Developed by a team of social and statistical scientists from Vox Pop Labs, VoteCompass is a civic engagement application offered in Canada exclusively by CBCNews. The findings are based on 11,657respondents who participated in VoteCompass from March 7to March 30, 2016. Unlike online opinion polls, respondentsto Vote Compass are not pre-selected.

Similar to opinion polls, however,the data are a non-random sample from the population and have been weightedin order to approximate a representative sample. Vote Compass data havebeen weighted by geography, gender, age, educational attainment, occupation,and religion to ensure the sample's composition reflects that of the actualpopulation of Saskatchewan according to census data and other populationestimates.