American politics right now is a battle of two tables; the actuarial table and the registration table.
Exciting to be able to able to share data from the @DemocracyFund +@Ucla Nationscape project on @Morning_Joe today!
According to over 128k survey interviews, Gen Z is shaping up to be the most liberal and democratic leaning generation in the country.https://t.co/D6BtzQeb6r
— Robert Griffin (@rp_griffin) December 17, 2019
The question is which one is working more. Will Millenials (now in their mid-20s to late 30s) and Gen Z register to vote and then vote at higher than historical rates before the Boomers and Silent Generation win their death bets?
Open thread
ruemara
Past results say no.
?BillinGlendaleCA
I’ll just note that Gen-X doesn’t look all that different than Boomers in political preferences.
trollhattan
My money’s on the newest generation of voters being just as unengaged as the last three or four. My kid and her friends are pre-registered if still under 18, or registered, and I’ll wager her HS class of 4-500 has only a hundred or so who have done this–which is so very easy in California compared to any red state and most of the blue ones.
Engagement struggles against hopelessness.
trollhattan
Is commenting jacked up ATM?
Fair Economist
By that table, the story is more the collapse of Republican support (down 19%, almost half) than the increase in Democratic (up 7% from the Silents, and not very different in the other 4 groups).
Mary G
I’m always telling the extreme Twitter progressives who spend all their time bitching about the establishment not allowing M4A and etc. that all the youngs want that until the youngs vote in numbers what they want is nobody’s concern and they tell me that if Democrats would go left, they would come. This is bullshit.
The March for Life kids seem like they are getting a bit disconnected and disillusioned, which is discouraging. OTOH, there are so many young volunteers showing up for all the campaigns, and youth turnout was way up in 2018, and I assume 2019 considering the results.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan: Yes.
Scott
I wonder what boomers and Gen X think about what they will leave their children or will they just think about themselves. I’m a boomer, wife GenX and all I can think about these days is about the future and how to position my children to thrive in it. It is driving me more toward Democrats because I think Republicans so hate Americans that they want to pull it all down about themselves.
Baud
Most young people aren’t interested in politics, even if those who are interested are
more liberal.
?BillinGlendaleCA
Cole’s twitter shows a new post “Bernie’s Right” and below “Page not Found”, heh.
ruemara
@Baud: The young and liberal are often more angry and hateful to Democrats than Republicans. I have no idea how we’re supposed to win like this.
Baud
@ruemara:
In terms of voters, that’s not true. We do better with younger voters. But they have more nonvotere.
ruemara
@Baud: We do better as a percentage, but they participate less and for many, what they hear on twitter & YouTube means Dems are the lesser evil and it doesn’t really matter who they vote for.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@ruemara: I’ll take lesser evil 24/7.
Ruviana
Hey David:
Any read on the 5th Circuit decision that just came down?
New Deal democrat
The chart is misleading. Mid-Boomers (those who formed their ideologies during the Nixon years) have always skewed somewhat blue. Late Boomers and the first half of Gex Xers, who formed their ideologies during the Carter and Reagan years, are even redder than the Silents. The generational cohorts in the graph miss this important division.
While team Blue will get a mild boost from the passage of the Silents and early Boomers, the really conservatives cohorts who worship St. Ronnie are going to be around for a long time.
And no, the young aren’t going to vote.
Ten Bears
I seem to recall mentioning numerous times here and there – well, maybe not here but certainly at Pretentious Pop-Guns & Pesos, NoMoreMister, the Boo Bunch, Your Daily Chaos … – in sixteen and the run-up to sixteen that maybe it really wasn’t such a good idea to piss off the largest, fastest growing demographic in the known history of voting. Alas, Cassandra’s Grandson.
ruemara
@?BillinGlendaleCA: But many don’t want to, until after they realize that there’s no lesser evil, there’s evil vs average humans. Unfortunately, then they have to figure out that they’re not saints or they double down.
mad citizen
The voting franchise should cut off around age 75 or 80.
SFAW
I expect it may depend on whether the Rethug legislatures can pass laws saying “you must be at least this
tallold to be allowedon this rideto vote.” They’ve already done their damnedest to screw over college-age (potential) voters; no reason they won’t try to expand the (disen)franchise.WaterGirl
@trollhattan: In what way?
trollhattan
@WaterGirl:
Posting delay after several refreshes and the return of popping to the page top, after all had worked in the previous thread.
Predictably unpredictable. :-
ETA five refreshes before this posted. But there’s an edit function!
Shuggoth
Apparently the rate of millennial voter turnout almost doubled from 2014 to 2018.
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/05/29/gen-z-millennials-and-gen-x-outvoted-older-generations-in-2018-midterms/
(Edited: 2018 not 2016)
WaterGirl
@trollhattan: Thanks for the info.
OGLiberal
If I look at these numbers – and, seriously, there can’t be many Silent generation or older folks left – I say, “We got this easy”, even discounting Gen Z, some of whom – I assume – can’t vote yet. But we don’t “got this easy” – not even close. I have to think that it’s because the still living Silents and Boomers vote in much larger numbers than the other generations. Also, I’m a Gen-Xer and we suck. Too many Reagan kids, young folks who grew up thinking Gordon Gekko was the victim in “Wall Street”. I know way too many Gen-Xers who think that they are just around the corner to being “wealthy” (they aren’t) and who think that there are “some” people that are holding them back from that goal. I don’t understand why they think this way – and I grew-up and live in a very blue location.
I know that there is a lot of Boomer bashing lately and the Boomers don’t appreciate it. And many fought the good fight for civil rights and against the Vietnam War. Understood. But I also know that I see pictures like this from the early-to-mid 60s and most of the folks throwing the abuse are not old people – they are Boomers. Half the Boomers fought the good fight, the other half did this: https://www.chicagotribune.com/resizer/N5tt8raXBfN576AOTfWGOGE87oA=/800×450/top/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-tronc.s3.amazonaws.com/public/VOMMATDY5ZCUXMQXXBAXVL2QRU.jpg
Many of these people are still alive – and they vote, in larger percentages than the younger generations. And not for Democrats.
AnonPhenom
@OGLiberal:
That picture is from May 1963.
How many 17 year olds do you see in that picture?
Ten Bears
That map is Verizon’s cell coverage …
OGLiberal
@AnonPhenom: Some of the dudes behind the protestors look quite young. And if they weren’t born in ‘46 or after they also weren’t born much earlier than that. Technically, maybe not Boomers but my liberal dad was born in ‘46 and he has much more in common with somebody born in ‘42 than someone born in ‘37. Just saying that those dudes are much closer to Boomer than Silent.