Pat Dollard

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(CNN) – President Barack Obama’s overall approval rating has dropped below 50 percent as a growing number of Americans worry that the U.S. is likely to slip into another Great Depression within the next 12 months, according to a new national CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll released Wednesday.

Forty-eight percent say that another Great Depression is likely to occur in the next year – the highest that figure has ever reached. The survey also indicates that just under half live in a household where someone has lost a job or are worried that unemployment may hit them in the near future. The poll was conducted starting Friday, when the Labor Department reported that the nation’s jobless rate edged up to 9.1 percent.

“The poll reminded respondents that during the Depression in the 1930s, roughly one in four workers were unemployed, banks failed, and millions of Americans were homeless or unable to feed their families,” says Holland. “And even with that reminder, nearly half said that another depression was likely in the next 12 months. That’s not just economic pessimism – that’s economic fatalism.”

Not surprisingly, with that much economic angst, the economy is the number one issue, the only one that more than half of the public says will be extremely important to their vote for president next year.

The CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll was conducted June 3-7, with 1,015 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey’s overall sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.