WASHINGTON — Most Americans do not believe the government has responsibility for bailing out financial firms with taxpayer money, a core part of the rescue plan Congress is considering to halt the near-meltdown of the nation's financial markets, a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found.

Reluctance to use public money to rescue private firms runs across all parts of the population — Democrats and Republicans, high-income and low-income families alike — the poll found.

When asked whether the government should use taxpayer dollars to rescue ailing financial firms whose collapse could have adverse effects on the economy, 55 percent of the poll's respondents said they did not believe the government should be responsible for funding a bailout plan. However, when some of those who opposed a bailout were interviewed, several said they reluctantly would accept a bailout plan if Congress decided one was necessary.

"It sticks in my craw," said Camille Woyak, 82, a retired office worker in Appleton, Wis., who said she opposed a bailout. "There should be some other solution. But I think the taxpayers are going to have to cover it. I don't know any other way out."

"I lived through the Depression as a little girl," she added. "I don't want to go through that again."

Even voters who said they supported a government-funded bailout said they weren't happy about the idea.

"Normally, I'd like to keep government out of the economy as much as we can," said Morris Vermeulen, 73, a retired housing inspector in Rogers, Ark. "But somebody's got to do something. We can't have a complete financial collapse."

Still, Vermeulen added, he hoped Congress would find a way to penalize the Wall Street financial houses for forcing taxpayers to come to their aid. "We should draw a little blood from them," he said.

That mix of sentiments is one factor that has caused some Democrats and Republicans in Congress to balk at the Bush administration's bailout plan. Democrats have demanded new aid for distressed homeowners and limits on the pay of top executives whose firms get help. Some conservative Republicans have said the plan is an unwarranted use of taxpayer money to intervene in the private markets.

Other polls have found that voters want the government to do something to prevent a financial collapse, even though they do not like the idea of footing the bill. A Pew Research Center Poll released yesterday, for example, found that 57 percent of respondents said the government was doing the right thing by intervening to stabilize the economy.

The contrast between the two polls probably reflects the different wording of the questions.

The Times/Bloomberg Poll asked respondents if they believed it was "the government's responsibility to bail out private companies with taxpayers' dollars." A majority said no.

The Pew Poll, by contrast, asked respondents if "investing billions to try and keep financial institutions and markets secure" was the right thing to do. A majority said yes.

In the Times/Bloomberg poll, a large majority, 62 percent, said they believed insufficient government regulation was partly responsible for the financial crisis.

As to where the blame should go, Americans are divided: 32 percent blamed Wall Street financial institutions, and 26 percent blamed the Bush administration. (Democrats tended to blame the administration; Republicans tended to blame Wall Street.)

Most Americans also oppose federal loans to help ailing automakers, another proposal Congress is considering, the poll found. Among all respondents, 64 percent said they opposed government loans to automotive firms, and 25 percent were in favor.

The financial crisis has helped push public gloom to a record depth: Seventy-nine percent of adults said they thought the country was "on the wrong track," the the largest percentage holding that view ever recorded by the Times Poll.

Asked whether the country was "generally going in the right direction" or "on the wrong track," 79 percent said "wrong track" and 13 percent said "right direction." That exceeded the previous record of 78 percent "wrong track" responses in June.

When people in the survey were asked whether they felt the nation's economy was doing well or badly, 81 percent said the economy was doing badly, an increase from 76 percent recorded in August — and close to the record high of 82 percent recorded in June, when energy prices were soaring.

The nation's focus on the faltering economy appeared to bolster Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee, who has been seen by most voters all year as a better economic leader than Republican John McCain.

Asked which candidate could do a better job of handling the financial crisis as president next year, 48 percent of registered voters named Obama and 35 percent named McCain.