We’ve got about ten days until the 2018 midterm elections and I’d like to make a few predictions and elicit some from my commenters.
The Democrats will pick up a few governor’s mansions but Republicans will continue to hold significantly more.
I think that Republicans are likely to pick up a few seats in the Senate.
I don’t believe the battle for the House is quite what you may have heard. There are 435 seats in the House and all are of the seats are being voted on. Incumbents are running for re-election to about 370 of those seats and they will overwhelmingly be re-elected. Many are uncontested, effectively if not formally. Here in the Illinois 5th District, for example, although I know that Mike Quigley has a Republican running against him I haven’t seen any ads on television for either Quigley or his opponent and I haven’t received any mail adverts from the Republican candidate. I suspect that most of the people in the district aren’t even aware that a Republican is running against Quigley. That’s opposition in name only.
A few incumbents may be defeated for re-election but overwhelmingly they will be returned to office. That’s true of Democrats and Republicans alike.
The battleground is over the sixty some-odd seats. Some of those elections will turn on party affiliation and in most of the rest the better candidate will win. The degree to which the battle for the House is a referendum on Trump is greatly exaggerated.
When the dust has settled I think the Democrats will hold the House by a very narrow majority, considerably smaller than the Republicans’ present House majority. A lot less will actually have happened than you might have been led to believe.
There are a few things that could upset that calculation. It’s possible, just barely possibly in my estimation, that people are lying to pollsters to an unexpected degree, the election is in fact a referendum on Trump, and Trump is a lot more popular than the New York Times, Washington Post, and other major media outlets would lead you to believe. If that’s the case Republicans could actually pick up seats in the House. I’m skeptical but it could happen.
Maybe the Democrats will be able to make hay out of the archetypal Florida Man who sent a bunch of pipebombs through the mail to various nationally prominent Democrats. Unless Republicans make the mistake of keeping that idiotic whackjob in the news, it’s likely he will be forgotten by Tuesday. If he remains a topic, Democrats could pick up a few additional seats.
I think the Democrats are underestimating the significance of the caravan of asylum/job seekers making its way north through Mexico. If that caravan is in the tens of thousands and massing on the border on election day, it could swing some races towards the Republican candidates.
Some revelation in domestic politics could swing the vote one way or another. International events tend to promote a “rally ’round” effect that would help the Republicans. With Trump you just never can tell.
What do you think the outcome of the midterm elections will be?
The Republicans retain both houses. Democrats will amass about 56% of the national votes for the House, but fall short by 4 or 5 seats of regaining control.
Steve
Dave: “It’s possible, just barely possibly in my estimation, that people are lying to pollsters to an unexpected degree,”
It’s not that people are lying to pollsters, it’s that they’re just not talking to them. It has been reported in a number of places that the response rate, completed surveys per contact, is less than 10%. Who are the “Chatty Cathys”? Is there a correlation between willingness to talk and political affiliation? Nobody knows ’cause they ain’t talking.
My own readings say that the Republican pick up seats in the House and maybe 7-12 in the Senate.
I’m surprised by Steve’s prediction.
I’ve heard the same as what Roy posted — that pollsters are having a hard time getting hold of people to gauge their voting projections on. People either are not reachable or simply don’t want to talk to them. Consequently, this election, for me is unfathomable, except for the Senate, in which I think the R’s will hold on with a few extra seats. I also think the R’s will lose some governor seats, but not willing to say how many. In FL., I am finding it hard to believe Gillum is always ahead. He seems so out of step for FL, IMO.
What really blows me out, though, are Trump’s rallies. They are always full to the brim with people enthusiastically waiting outside in overflow areas — rain or shine. Today’s daytime rally, for instance, in S. Illinois, had lines waiting for a mile! I just don’t get it! Why is he so popular in these venues, while so unpopular, or so it seems, everywhere else?
Jan makes a very good point about the attendance at Trump’s rallies. Answering a pollster takes 10 minutes. Going to see Trump is a day and a half affair. Might be a bit of an enthusiasm gap.
There is a frequent criticism of the polls that they oversample Democrats. This may indicate that the non-responders are principally Trump supporters.
In every mid-term I have watched, 1954 was the first, there has been talk of “nationalizing” the election. That only happened in 1994 (D -54) and 2010 (D -63). I sense that it is happening this year. I think the outcome is going to surprise an awful lot of people.
steve: The Republicans retain both houses. Democrats will amass about 56% of the national votes for the House, but fall short by 4 or 5 seats of regaining control.
If compromise were the norm, that wouldn’t be a problem, but in the current environment, that would be a prescription for political instability, with the majority seeing its say in national decisions being curtailed.
Roy Lofquist: There is a frequent criticism of the polls that they oversample Democrats. This may indicate that the non-responders are principally Trump supporters.
National polls were quite close in 2016, showing Clinton with a 1-4% lead in the days before the election. The final result was Clinton +2%.
which is precisely the argument in favor of a federal system. The federal government looms too large in areas other than national defense and foreign policy. Creating a national tyranny is not the solution.
Another, poorer alternative would be to greatly increase the number of representatives. A country our size should have no fewer than 2,200 representatives in its lower house.
Dave Schuler: which is precisely the argument in favor of a federal system. The federal government looms too large in areas other than national defense and foreign policy.
Federal involvement is a necessity in the modern world, on which infrastructure, the economics of defence, and worker and individual rights all depend.
Gingrich instituted a policy of not legislating by consensus. If you could pass legislation by 70-30% or even 60-40%, it means the legislation wasn’t “conservative” enough. New “conservative” provisions could be added until paring the vote down to a bare majority vote. Hastert instituted a policy of never allowing legislation to come to the floor unless it had majority of the majority support. In other words, legislation that might otherwise have broad support would never see the light of day.
If a minority wins control of the House, the Senate, the Presidency, and the Courts, and if that minority eschews compromise, the majority will justly feel disenfranchised.
@Dave Schuler
… no fewer than 2,200 …
I do not think it is workable. Committee hearings would take months for all the members to get their 5 minutes.
On the plus side, the cost of lobbying would skyrocket.
Who’s arguing for no federal involvement? The question is whether more federal involvement or less would be beneficial. IMO federal involvement is actually producing a substantial misallocation of resources.
Consider infrastructure, for example. Do we need more interstates or fewer? More bridges or fewer? The politics of federal highway money pushes us to ever more highways and bridges. What are obviously local highways in Hawaii along with the commuter roads around major cities are presently built with with federal funds and supposedly maintained with local taxes. The federal demand for money drains state and local governments of resources.
Again, we are simply too big for a central government that controls everything. IMO at this point less federal involvement would be better than more.
which is why there should be more devolution.
Dave Schuler: Consider infrastructure, for example. Do we need more interstates or fewer? More bridges or fewer?
Infrastructure investment is trillions of dollars short—just to maintain current roads and bridges. Meanwhile, new infrastructure means things like satellites (e.g. GPS, climate), and information technologies (e.g. security), not roads and bridges.
Dave Schuler: Again, we are simply too big for a central government that controls everything.
The federal government doesn’t control everything, however, it is a necessary component of modern society, especially with regards to economics.
Dave Schuler: IMO at this point less federal involvement would be better than more.
State governments are not capable of solving problems that are national in scope, and people won’t look towards their state government to do so. In any case, at current levels of federal involvement, a minority that controls all three branches of government, especially one that doesn’t compromise, will be politically destabilizing.
Tell Congress. When politicians talk about infrastructure mostly they mean roads and bridges. It’s the 21st version of “bringing home the bacon”. Presently, the federal government’s spending on private sector security approaches zero. It’s barely able to secure itself let alone the rest of the country.
And federal spending on private sector security is a hard sell. It doesn’t create a lot of minimum wage jobs.
Especially with respect to money. It’s why we have a Federal Reserve. But the federal government and public/private hybrids have been complete flops at bank regulation and there’s a good reason for it—regulatory capture. As evidence I’d submit that during the financial crisis nearly 1,000 small banks were shuttered but no big banks were although it wasn’t small banks that had caused the problem to begin with. But the big banks were too big to be allowed to fail and that will be even truer the next time. As mentioned by one of the commenters above, nationalizing everything reduces the opportunity cost for lobbyists.
The federal government is even worse at counter-cyclical stimulus. I’m one of those who continue to think that Keynes’s views were largely correct. The problem is the role of politics which results in stimulus inevitably being applied too late, in the wrong amount, and in the wrong places.
Agreed. But not all problems are national in scope. A man growing grain on his own land and feeding it to his cattle is not national in scope even though it has a miniscule effect on the grain market. A bridge entirely within state lines is not of national scope.
Deciding that everything no matter how small is of national scope inevitably results in increasing deadweight loss and increasing corruption at the national level.
All of the things you’re pointing out are the consequences of centralization rather than an argument for more centralization.
Dave Schuler: When politicians talk about infrastructure mostly they mean roads and bridges.
It’s a current topic in Congress due to the need for traditional infrastructure improvement. However, government is active in many other areas as well, scientific and technological.
Dave Schuler: But not all problems are national in scope.
No, but history has shown that many problems that were once considered local are anything but.
Dave Schuler: All of the things you’re pointing out are the consequences of centralization rather than an argument for more centralization.
We didn’t argue for more centralization, but that the current levels of centralization have an historical basis. It’s unlikely that devolution will work. State governments have not able to solve a host of problems, economic and social, and the federal government has often been called upon to intervene. The Great Depression is the canonical example of a national response to a crisis; and as for a national effort, the Apollo Space Program, which vastly expanded America’s technological and scientific infrastructure.
Circling back to the original point, if a minority controls all three branches of government, as forecast by steve above, and if that minority continues to eschew compromise, it will increase political instability.
I’m sorry if I misunderstood you. In life things rarely stay the same. Consequently, one is inevitably either arguing for more centralization or less. Since I think a lot of today’s problems are caused by incorrect regulatory and spending priorities at the national level, i.e. not necessarily more regulation or more spending but different regulation and different spending, I am predisposed to think that less centralization would be better. Federal priorities are very hard to change since each one of them has a constituency for which it’s a matter of life and death.
What do you think?
Just as an observation, the Great Depression started 90 years ago and the space program 60 years ago. In 1929 as a percentage of total GDP, federal spending was less than 4%. Today it’s about 20%.
Do you think we’d be better off with current priorities if federal spending were 21% of GDP or 19%?
I missed this:
Total federal spending on scientific and technological research is about $86 billion, about half of which is medical research. The $86 billion is about 20% of all scientific and technological research.
IMO much of the federal medical research spending is misspent.
In general I think we’d be better off with a federal-financed mass engineering program like the space program or the interstate highway program (as it existed a half century ago) than with more “basic research”. The ROI on such programs is significantly better. More basic research emerged from the space program than from funds earmarked for basic research.
But, again, those are hard sells nowadays.
Dave Schuler: Federal priorities are very hard to change since each one of them has a constituency for which it’s a matter of life and death. What do you think?
Sure, that, and that the American political system tends to resist change. Programs are hard to implement, and are harder to dismantle.
Dave Schuler: Do you think we’d be better off with current priorities if federal spending were 21% of GDP or 19%?
If the government sector is too large, typically over 1/3 or so, then economic development stalls. If the government sector is too small, then it will be unable to respond during a crisis, leading to widespread suffering and political instability. The difference between 19-21% is well within those limits.
Dave Schuler: IMO much of the federal medical research spending is misspent.
Figure half is wasted, assuming good management. Then there’s the other half.
the other half.
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/nih-grantees-win-2018-nobel-prize-physiology-or-medicine