Americans' satisfaction with the state of the nation -- particularly the economy -- has mostly improved since last January, a new Gallup poll finds. (AP File Photo)

(CNSNews.com) - Americans are feeling far more upbeat this January than they were a year ago, especially about the economy, according to Gallup's annual "Mood of the Nation" poll, which is conducted each January.

The most recent poll, conducted Jan. 4-8, finds a whopping 80 percent of Americans are satisfied with "the overall quality of life," up four points from a year ago.

Another 66 percent of Americans gave thumbs-up to "the opportunity for a person to get ahead by working hard," and that's also a four point increase from a year ago.

Of the 28 categories measured by Gallup, 20 showed positive movement in the last year; two showed no change; and six categories showed reduced satisfaction year-to-year.

Let's look at the 20 areas where American's satisfaction with the state of the nation showed positive change from January 2016 to January 2017:

The largest jump in satisfaction had to do with the "state of the nation's economy": 46 percent of Americans expressed satisfaction, a 12-point jump since last year. That 12-point shift was the largest of any category Gallup measured.

41 percent of Americans expressed satisfaction with "the level of immigration into the country today," up 11 points from last year.

Here is the entire list, as presented by Gallup:

“According to Gallup, “Over the final three years of Obama's presidency, Americans also have become much less satisfied with race relations than they were during his first years in office and during most of the George W. Bush administration.



Clearly, despite the historic nature of his election, Obama's legacy is not going to be focused on achieving racial harmony or erasing the race relations problems that have been a part of American culture in one way or another since the nation's inception.”

Gallup also pointed to Donald Trump’s “rhetoric surrounding race and ethnic and religious minorities since the beginning of his presidential campaign has been controversial.

“Trump has promised that black Americans will, within four years, be thankful for his presidency and vote for him in large numbers if he runs for re-election in 2020. How Trump's actions and policies will affect either the reality or the perception of race problems in the years ahead remains to be seen.”

(Results for the Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted Jan. 4-8, 2017, with a random sample of 1,032 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. For results based on the total sample of national adults, the margin of sampling error is ±4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. All reported margins of sampling error include computed design effects for weighting.)