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ELECTORAL ARITHMETIC: WON'T SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN?
Back in 2004, there was a lot of talk about getting out the youth vote with the implicit assumption being that young people automatically vote for Democrats. It's true that younger people do tend to vote Democratic, but only marginally so, and hardly in numbers that could easily decide an election. Now from Pew, we're seeing that this might be changing, and changing big. In 2004, Democrats only held an 11-point advantage over Republicans in party ID. By 2008, that figure has shot to 25 points. To put another way, in 2004 54 percent of 18-29 year-olds voted for Kerry, 45 percent for Bush. That's within 4 points of the party ID figures. In 2004, 18-29 year-olds made up 17 percent of the voting population, casting over 20 million votes, 11 million of which went to Kerry.
Now, if we assume that 18-29 year olds make up the same percentage of the population in 2008 as they did in 2004, and give them a seven point bump, then that means 61 percent of 18-29 year-olds will vote Democratic, netting over 12 million votes. What does an additional 1 million votes get you? If this were the 2004 election, all else being equal, that's brings the popular vote to within 1-1.5 percentage points instead of 3. I'd call that significant.
--Mori Dinauer
COMMENTS (12)
Research in public opinion shows that lifetime party ID is determined by choices made when a voter is between the ages of 17 and 26. That makes this very good news for the Democratic party. However, this advantage possibly could be lost if superdelegates flock to Clinton over Obama and young voters see this movement as illegitimate.
Posted by: jonm | April 29, 2008 9:28 AM
What jonm said.
If it comes down to a choice between winning this Presidential election, and building an enduring Democratic majority, I'm strongly in favor of doing the things that build the enduring majority.
Whether or not we win this Presidential election is a fluky business, and will hang on things like just how deeply in the tank the media are for McCain, and how much the race will be about Jeremiah Wright (if Obama is nominated) or about Bosnian snipers and castrating you-know-whats (if Clinton is).
But we can keep on capturing the incoming generation of voters, and we can keep on building our Congressional majority, because it doesn't seem like the MoDos of the world can play games with either of those things.
Posted by: low-tech cyclist | April 29, 2008 9:48 AM
"If it comes down to a choice between winning this Presidential election, and building an enduring Democratic majority, I'm strongly in favor of doing the things that build the enduring majority."
From your mouth to the superdelegates' ears.
Posted by: brewmn | April 29, 2008 10:20 AM
The graph is really just a sign of the collapse of the Republican Party. They have failed to delivery on anything that they have campaigned on and have failed to be conservative in any meaningful way.
The real question is what will the U.S. be like as a one party state with the Democratic Party being as dominate on the national level as it is now dominate in states like Maryland or Mass.
Posted by: superdestroyer | April 29, 2008 10:53 AM
If Billary manages to STEAL this nomination from Obama, I for one Democrat will leave this party. I would like the Obama supporters to start a new Party (maybe call it the Wright Party) so as to remind the MSM and all other politicians that Wright did not hurt Obama afterall! I personally am sick of what has been happening with the SDs, the MSM manufactured "wins" of Billary, and the "guilt by association" that the MSM has played with ONLY OBAMA! Is that what this election has come down to? Why don't we stand up to the MSM and make them report fairly?
Posted by: Disparaged | April 29, 2008 2:10 PM
"If we assume that 18-29 year olds make up the same percentage of the population in 2008 as they did in 2004, and give them a seven point bump, then that means 61 percent of 18-29 year-olds will vote Democratic..."
Are we forgetting that as people get older they tend to migrate to the repub party?
Posted by: sbj | April 29, 2008 4:06 PM
SBJ: What's interesting about the voters who are older than 29 is that Bush increased his margins with those voters over his performance in 2000. In fact, Bush won the 60-and-older crowd 54-46 in 2004 -- a seven point margin -- which is exactly how much he improved from 2000, where he lost to Gore in this group 51-47. In each other over-29 age group in 2000, Bush won by a single point, so it doesn't strike me as a truism that older voters vote Republican (at least in the last two elections).
Voters 65 and older are probably more likely to vote Democratic because of Social Security, which Bush wisely (never thought I put those two words together) didn't raise as an issue until after the 2004 election.
Posted by: Mori Dinauer | April 29, 2008 4:55 PM
BJ: What's interesting about the voters who are older than 29 is that Bush increased his margins with those voters over his performance in 2000. In fact, Bush won the 60-and-older crowd 54-46 in 2004 -- a seven point margin -- which is exactly how much he improved from 2000, where he lost to Gore in this group 51-47. In each other over-29 age group in 2000, Bush won by a single point, so it doesn't strike me as a truism that older voters vote Republican (at least in the last two elections).
Voters 65 and older are probably more likely to vote Democratic because of Social Security, which Bush wisely (never thought I put those two words together) didn't raise as an issue until after the 2004 election.
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