Only 10% of Americans rate the honesty and ethics of advertising practitioners as high or very high
Verified Confidence: high
Primary source found; it says the same thing, the scope matches, and it is reasonably current.
- Commonly cited as
- "Only 1 in 10 people think advertisers are honest"
- True origin
- Gallup — Honesty/Ethics in Professions (Dec. 2025 update)
- Type
- Stat check: A widely repeated statistic traced back to its origin.
- Year
- 2025
- Data as of
- Gallup poll, Dec. 1–15, 2025
- Last checked
- What the source says
Advertising Practitioners Very high High Average Low Very low No opinion Very high/High % % % % % % % 2025 Dec 1-15 2 8
- Method & sample
- Gallup Poll Social Series telephone survey of US adults; respondents rate each profession from very high to very low. Advertising practitioners: 2% very high, 8% high, 41% average, 31% low, 14% very low.
- Drift between quote and source
- Rounding: 2% very high + 8% high; 45% rate them low or very low
- Interest
- n/a (independent polling firm; the Social Series is self-funded).
Safe rephrasing
In Gallup's December 2025 honesty-and-ethics poll, 10% of US adults rated advertising practitioners high or very high (2% very high, 8% high), while 45% rated them low or very low.
Sources we opened
- Gallup — Honesty/Ethics in Professions (primary)
Machine-readable: /api/claims/gallup-advertising-practitioners-10-percent-honest.json · Last checked 2026-10-16