A Black President & Alien Contact: How 1998 Predictions About 2025 Stacked Up
In 1998, Americans were asked to predict what life would look like in 2025. In the pre-smartphone era, Gallup and USA Today polled 1,055 Americans about their expectations for the future.
State of play: Bill Clinton was president and was facing impeachment, Titanic was sweeping the Oscars, and 96% of households had landline phones.
Americans predicted the election of a Black president, the legalization of same-sex marriage, and even the emergence of a “deadly new disease.” Others, like a cure for cancer or the election of a female president, have yet to materialize.
SOME OF THE RESULTS
75% Predicted A Deadly New Disease: COVID-19 was named a global pandemic in 2020. SARS-CoV-2, which first surfaced in Wuhan, China, killed more than 20 million people.
Five years after massive lockdowns, 72% of U.S. adults say the pandemic did more to divide the country than unite it.
74% Predicted Gay Marriages Will Be Commonplace: Same-sex marriage was legalized nationwide following the 2015 Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges.
By 2024, nearly 70% of Americans support the legalization of same-sex marriage, with 64% viewing gay or lesbian relations as morally acceptable. In 1996, Gallup found that 27% of Americans thought such unions should be legal.
69% Predicted U.S. Will Have Elected A Black President: Barack Obama was elected in 2008 and re-elected in 2012.
Despite 66% of Americans in 1998 expecting a woman to win by 2025, Democratic candidates Hillary Clinton in 2016 and Kamala Harris in 2024 both lost their bids to Donald Trump.
56% Predicted Most Stores Will Be Replaced By Online Shopping: U.S. e-commerce sales hit $310 billion in Q3 2025, a 1.9% increase from the previous quarter. The growth outpaced total retail sales, which rose 1.5% to reach nearly $1.9 trillion, U.S. Census data shows. E-commerce now makes up more than 16% of total retail.
Major U.S. retailers announced more than 7,300 store closures in 2024, up nearly 60% from 2023, according to Coresight Research.
About 60% Predicted Cancer, AIDS Will Be Cured: Neither AIDS nor cancer have been “cured” universally, but treatments have improved greatly.
In 2022, there were almost 20 million new cases of cancer and nearly 10 million cancer-related deaths worldwide. Around 41 million people were living with HIV globally at the end of 2024, and around 630,000 people died from AIDS-related illnesses worldwide.
25% Predicted Humans Will Have Made/Received Alien Contact: Not official contact, but in September, a U.S. House subcommittee unveiled never-before-seen video showing an unidentified flying object being struck by a U.S. Hellfire missile and continuing to fly.
Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) said the “remarkable” footage appears to show the object shifting form with smaller objects trailing behind after it was hit. It was the third congressional hearing on unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAPs), aka UFOs, since 2023.
Bottom line: Americans in 1998 were pretty accurate about social change and global instability — but too optimistic about medical breakthroughs and technological leaps.