GOP NOT THE PARTY OF THE RICH AND CORPORATIONS...NOT

THE GOP WANTS US TO BELIEVE THEY ARE NOT THE PARTY OF THE RICH AND THE CORPORATIONS

IT TAKES TESTICULAR FORTITUDE TO MAKE THAT CLAIM

I received a comment a couple of days ago from someone who was reflecting GOP talking points and this person did so anonymously; which leaves me wondering if it isn’t someone directly associated with the Republican Party. They do have people monitoring blogs like mine in an effort to try to silence or neutralize us.

PAUL KRUGMAN

October 24, 2007, 11:17 pm

Even more on income and voting

As I pointed out in an earlier post, there’s a weird myth among the commentariat that rich people vote Democratic. There’s another strange thing about that myth: the notion that income class doesn’t matter for voting, or that it’s perverse, has spread even as the actual relationship between income and voting has become much stronger.

Larry Bartels offers us these data, which I also provide in Conscience of a Liberal, on white voting patterns in presidential elections by income:

As you can see, a 4-point difference between top and bottom became a 14-point difference.

Andrew Gelman et al offer us an election-by-election graph; the dots represent an estimate of the effect of income on the tendency to vote Republican, the whiskers the range of statistical uncertainty. Again, a weak link in the earlier period, except when Barry Goldwater was the candidate, and a much stronger link since then.

So the conventional pundit wisdom about the relationship between class and voting is, literally, the opposite of the truth.

24 Comments

1. 1. October 25, 2007 7:03 am Link

But as I’ve pointed out in the other threads, this pattern is the *opposite* of what we see on the state level. The conventional wisdom is correct that rich *states* vote Democratic. I cannot figure out how these two patterns can coexist. Is it something about income inequality? Do most rich people not live in rich states, somehow?

— Doctor Science

2. 2. October 25, 2007 7:55 am Link

Does this suggest that as income disparity grows, more people will vote Democratic? Does the Republican approach to economic policy insure their eventual demise?

— ScottKnick

3. 3. October 25, 2007 9:45 am Link

“there’s a weird myth among the commentariat that rich people vote Democratic”

Couldn’t this be put down to the idea that Repubs and their commentariat cohorts are trying to convince people that the tax cuts actually help rich Democrats?. If people start believing that the rich are Dems (the Kennedy’s, Hollywood) then the Repub tax cuts for the rich will lose their effect as a Dem tool.

Dr. Science- Rich states have a better educated electorate. I think there are studies that show a correlation between education levels and voting patterns. Perhaps people with college and over education are exposed to a larger world view and thus can see the benefits of “the common good.”

— mpower1952

4. 4. October 25, 2007 10:34 am Link

There’s something in statistics called Simpson’s paradox that describes the seeming weirdness of the WITHIN state versus BETWEEN state voting effects described by Andy Gelman & co.

WITHIN each state Andy Gelman and co. found increased wealth correlated positively with increased likelihood of voting Republican (always, whatever state). However, he also showed the strength of the correlation varied BETWEEN states inversely by overall wealth of the state. So if people do not examine the within state effect, and only refer to a between state effect, they might mistakenly conclude that rich people are attracted to the Democratic party. But that would be wrong. Andy G & co show us that it is, in fact, consistently the poorer people within each state driving the Democratic vote of the state. And it is always the wealthier within each state driving the Republican vote.

The within state effect is the better one to rely upon when speaking of voting patterns. The between state effect is due to unequal distribution of incomes and wealthier people being lumped up along the coasts in general.

Alan Agresti has this book on Introductory Categorical Data Analysis that has more examples of Simpson’s paradox, including a powerful one that has to do with racial bias and the death penalty.

What might have been controversial is if Andy G & co had found at least a few states that failed to have within them a positive slope between increased income and increased likelihood of voting Republican. I gather from reading their paper that no exceptions emerged. So yeah, looks to me a lot like Republicans are the party of the affluent and Democrats the party of the poor and working class (statistically speaking).

I’m not an unconditional fan of yours, Professor Krugman. I’m a fan because you do such an excellent job at observing, analyzing and communicating. Plus you provide links to good information!

— lois

5. 6. October 25, 2007 10:50 am Link

“But as I’ve pointed out in the other threads, this pattern is the *opposite* of what we see on the state level. The conventional wisdom is correct that rich *states* vote Democratic. I cannot figure out how these two patterns can coexist. Is it something about income inequality? Do most rich people not live in rich states, somehow?”
It’s easy to explain. Look at two of the richest States. New York and California. Yes a lot of rich folks live there. But they are still a small set of the voters, the majority of the voters are still middle class and lower income. These States tax their wealthy to a greater extend to provide a safety net for the poor. The people like the “Democratic” ideas of shared responsibilities and the rich don’t seem to mind since they continue to live there and keep the system running.
Even the Republicans who take office in these States like Pataki and Schwarzenegger are socially progressive.
So even though so called rich States vote Democratic the rich may still vote Republican.

— edhopper

6. 7. October 25, 2007 11:51 am Link

Perhaps the contradiction of the patterns is because “rich” states has a large thriving middle class and less rich states such as the one I live in have a greater disparity of income. It has always been true in Texas that the rich vote Republican.

— inTexas

7. 8. October 25, 2007 1:53 pm Link

Or, as Dinesh D’Souza put it: “Republicans are the party of winners, Democrats are the party of losers.” But they really only say this stuff when they think they’re alone.

— Noddy Jackson

8. 9. October 25, 2007 2:16 pm Link

The average income of a state depends on how poor “poor” are and on how rich the “rich” are. If you look at the maps of poverty and income inequality provided at the with the map of income by state (see link in Doctor Science post ) you can see how these two patterns can coexist.

— joan

9. 10. October 25, 2007 2:54 pm Link

1) Isn’t this possibly an artifact of people’s perceptions. The wealthy that are high profile – people who hold/attend benefits and the elite of the entertainment industry do probably tend to trend liberal that have to do with their proclivities (attending benefits to help people or a cause and as entertainers/artists) than their wealth. The vast majority of wealthy people however probably aren’t likely to fall into those categories.

Thus the perception is propped up by the high profile of wealthy celebrities who are left of center. But people don’t see the many many wealthy non-celebrities who are going to be centered in less liberal communities – upper management, business owners, etc.

2) That being said, you’re answering a different question about the relation between wealth and voting than the one that is essentially being framed by the commentariat. Being in the top third is not what people who are talking about wealthy liberals are talking about. Fairer answers to their question as framed would be to look at data from the top 10% or better still the top 5% or top 1% (though given that wealthy people are likely unlikely to take the time for things like the NES or the NSS, you’re going to get real potential for selection bias). I’d be surprised if it would be different but that’s really the type of people they’re talking about and answering their “myth” (which, again, I agree is probably not correct) with data split into thirds or from a linear coefficient for a hypothesized non-linear effect (they do all say the poor tend to vote Democratic too).

— John Hetts

10. 11. October 25, 2007 3:52 pm Link

Dr. S –

I suspect that the variation you see between states reflects population density. In my experience, wealthier individuals living in high density areas are more likely to be liberal.

It would be interesting to look at a county wide breakdown in a state like New Jersey, which tends to vote democratic overall, but has extraordinary variations in both population density and income levels.

— Amy

11. 12. October 25, 2007 6:17 pm Link

People’s minds are changed through observation and not through argument. – Will Rogers

The more you read and observe about this Politics thing, you got to admit that each party is worse than the other. The one that’s out always looks the best. – Will Rogers

In addition, I seem to recall that, according to recent polls, 40% or more of people thought that they were, or would soon be, in the top 10% of income levels. I suspect that has been changing recently. Could this illusion of prosperity and it’s subsequent change have had an impact on political affiliation?

The following Washington Post article by Harold Meyerson comments on some Pew Research Center Polls on the Have/Have-Not perceptions of Republicans and Democrats and seems to think this is the case. His point is that this is due to the undoing of the New Deal and that America stopped being “a land of broadly shared prosperity.”

“…
Americans’ assessment of their own place in the economy has altered, too. In 1988, fully 59 percent identified themselves as haves and just 17 percent as have-nots. By 2001, the haves had dwindled to 52 percent and the have-nots had risen to 32 percent. This summer, just 45 percent of Americans called themselves haves, while 34 percent called themselves have-nots.

These are epochal shifts, of epochal significance. The American middle class has toppled into a world of temporary employment, jobs without benefits, retirement without security. Harder times have come to left and right alike: The percentage of Republicans who call themselves haves has declined by 13 points since 1988; the percentage of Democratic haves has declined by 12 points.
…”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/26/AR2007092602069.html

— –Andrew

12. 15. October 26, 2007 7:59 am Link

Maybe more people reside in the lower third of income than in 68-72, taking in for inflation and stagnant wages.

— rpo choice li

13. 16. October 26, 2007 9:12 am Link

don’t forget the intrastate divergence between city and rural voting in the rich states- the cities vote democrat- yeah, that’s where the mega-rich live, but they are vastly outnumbered by the urban poor- this is why the Dems carry PA- the Repubs win in the vast area of the state, but the Dems carry Philly by such a wide margin that they win the state- I’d be interested if this would be a good campaign strategy- should the Dems concentrate on urban areas and hope to outproportion the rural vote which the Repubs are more likely to carry?

— frankenduf

14. 17. October 26, 2007 9:53 am Link

I think that this commentariat meme is basically propaganda that has only had very limited success to date among the population at large. The poor Democratic voters and rich Republicans know who they are themselves, after all. On the anecdotal level, I know quite a few wealthy Republicans who see their party affiliation as a matter of class loyalty.

— 1st Paradox

15. 18. October 26, 2007 12:01 pm Link

It’s not rich states that vote Democratic, but densely populated states. This is easier to see in states with wide disparities in population density, such as Oregon and Washington state — on the county level populated areas tend to vote Democrat, and less populated areas vote Republican.

— Will

16. 19. October 26, 2007 2:19 pm Link

Prior to 1972 there were no white Republicans south of the Mason-Dixon Line. In addition, the people who were voting in 1952-1972 were raised during the great depression and many of them voted knee-jerk Democratic because of that.

Placing charts like this out of historic context just leads people astray.

I do not expect you to publish this since it is critical of your agenda.

— Isabella Baumfree

17. 20. October 26, 2007 6:00 pm Link

I can’t find the data, but I remember distinctly a lecture in 2005 citing that 67% of those who earned between 250k and 5 million in 2003 voted for Bush in ‘04, but 75% of those who earned over 5 million voted for Kerry–this seems intuitively right to me.

— Richard Erickson

18. 21. October 26, 2007 8:02 pm Link

The Economist has data from Pew showing the two parties to be neck-and-neck at high income levels here: http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2007/10/cui_bozo.cfm

— TGGP

19. 22. October 28, 2007 8:39 am Link

Too bad those low income voters don’t get much for their votes. Chuck Schumer’s crusade to protect Hedge Fund managers from being taxed like the little people and to abolish the AMT show who is running the show.

Tell me again how “What’s the matter with Kansas?” is anything but a sick joke. The financial engineers are busy buying into the Democratic Presidential primaries with the money looted from high fee 401Ks and subprime mortgages.

— Don

20. 23. May 14, 2008 1:25 am Link

You may have something with this, Texas:

“Perhaps the contradiction of the patterns is because “rich” states has a large thriving middle class and less rich states such as the one I live in have a greater disparity of income. It has always been true in Texas that the rich vote Republican.— Posted by inTexas”

In the rich states, there is less of a gap between people, in the poor states there are more very poor people compared to the very wealthy, without much of a middle class. With less of a gap, there is more of a Democratic tendency, a more egalitarian attitude.

— splashy8

21. 24. January 16, 2009 2:45 pm Link

is this some sort of joke? You may want to consider the complete switch in ideology that took place in the democratic party. Before the 70s or so, democrats were a strange party that whole-heartedly supported segregation in the south and vehemently opposed it in the north. This blog is worthless.

— Ike

SOURCE: http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/24/even-more-on-income-and-voting/

The share of Americans who see the country as divided along economic lines has also continued to tick upward, though at a somewhat slower rate in recent years (Have/have-not perceptions rose by 18 points over the 13 years between 1988 and 2001 compared with a rise of four points over the last six years).

The increased prevalence of both views -- that the country is increasingly divided along economic lines and that a given individual is on the wrong side of that divide -- finds support in national economic data. As numerous studies have demonstrated in recent years, income gains over the last few decades have been heavily concentrated at the very top of the income distribution. For example, in an update of their earlier study of long-term U.S. income trends,¹ economists Piketty and Saez compute that the share of income going to families in the top 1% of the income scale has doubled from 8% in 1980 to 16% in 2004 even excluding capital gains.² (For a review of other recent studies see an earlier Pew commentary, "Pinched Pocketbooks: Do Average Americans Spot Something That Most Economists Miss?"³)

Meanwhile, Congressional Budget Office data⁴ show that despite the increase in the number of families with two or more earners and widespread income gains in the latter half of the 1990s, families in the middle fifth of the income distribution realized only a modest $6,600 increase in annual income between 1988 and 2004, while the top 1% of families saw their incomes rise from $839,100 to an average $1,259,700. Recently released Census Bureau data show that in 2006, median household income adjusted for inflation was still 2.1% below its 1999 level.⁵ More sensationally, Bloomberg.com recently reported on a study showing that "top private-equity and hedge fund managers made more in 10 minutes than average-paid U.S. workers earned all of last year."⁶

INTERESTING TABLE ON INCOME; SEE HOW THE RICH HAVE GOTTEN RICHER…LIKE I SAY: REDISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH HAS ALREADY TAKEN PLACE; IT HAS GONE FROM THE POOR AND THE MIDDLE CLASS TO THE VERY RICH.

SHARE OF ALL US PERSONAL INCOME

	TOP	TOP	BOTTOM
	1%	10%	50%
	OF INC	OF INC	OF INC
1980	8.46%	32.13%	17.68%
1981	8.30%	31.98%	17.75%
1982	8.91%	32.26%	17.71%
1983	9.29%	32.78%	17.48%
1984	9.66%	33.25%	17.44%
1985	10.03%	33.77%	17.26%
1986	11.30%	35.12%	16.66%
1987	12.32%	36.90%	15.63%
1988	15.16%	39.45%	14.93%
1989	14.19%	39.27%	14.96%
1990	14.00%	38.77%	15.03%
1991	12.99%	38.20%	15.13%
1992	14.23%	39.23%	14.92%
1993	13.79%	39.05%	14.92%
1994	13.80%	39.19%	14.89%
1995	14.60%	40.16%	14.54%
1996	16.04%	41.59%	14.08%
1997	17.38%	42.83%	13.84%
1998	18.47%	43.77%	13.67%
1999	19.51%	44.89%	13.25%
2000	20.81%	46.01%	12.99%
2001	17.58%	43.11%	13.81%
2002	16.12%	41.77%	14.23%
2003	16.77%	42.36%	13.99%
2004	19.00%	44.35%	13.42%
2005	21.20%	46.44%	12.83%
AVG	15.90%	40.97%	14.50%
% CHGE	+251%	+145%	-28%

What seems clear to me is that REDISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH has already taken place. After looking at these statistics, do you still love “Trickle Down” Economics?

SOURCE: http://money.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474977174033