At Liberal Patriot Ruy Teixeira warns Democrats that they are repeating the same mistake they made 20 years ago but this time instead making bad assumptions about black, Hispanic, and Asian voters they’re making incorrect assumptions about younger age groups. He starts by questioning just how progressive Generation Z actually is:
Just how progressive are today’s youth (or “youts†as My Cousin Vinny would have it)? It’s fair to say that compared to older generations they generally lean more left on most issues, are more likely to say they’re “liberal†and more likely to support Democrats. But that’s a relative assessment; it doesn’t follow logically that the entire generation is therefore “progressive,†especially as the term has come to be understood by Democrats.
This potential problem has been thrown into relief by recent poll findings that the show the youth vote lagging considerably for Democrats when Biden is matched against Trump in 2024 trial heats. Some polls even show Biden polling behind Trump among voters under 30 (a group dominated by members of Gen Z). But on average Biden is still polling ahead of Trump among these voters—the problem is that the margin in his favor is much less than it was in 2020.
Data from the Split Ticket analytics site, based on an average of December cross-tabular data, show Biden carrying 18-29 year olds by 11 points, a 12-point pro-Trump shift relative to Catalist estimates from 2020. Similarly, pollster John Della Volpe collected a number of mostly December 18-29 year old crosstabs on his site. These crosstabs average out to a 6-point advantage for Biden among voters under 30, a 17 point shift toward Trump relative to 2020.
Looking at polling data he finds that on issue after issue young voters see themselves as moderate to conservative and President Biden as being more progressive than they are: immigration, transgender issues, crime, oil and gas exploration.
Now there are actual several distinct possibilities. The first, as I have been pointing out for 20 years, is that placing yourself correctly on the left-right axis is highly subjective and that many people don’t actually know where their views lie on that axis. The second is that other than ideologues, the views of many people don’t fit neatly into any category. On some issues they’re progressive, on some conservative, on others moderate. A third is that President Biden is doing such a lousy job of communicating that respondents are incorrectly placing him on the political spectrum.
I don’t believe the third. To the contrary I think that the progressive wing of the party has been punching considerably above its weight since President Biden took office and whatever the president believes privately his actions have been more progressive than young voters are comfortable with.
He concludes:
The lesson here: Demographics are not destiny. This cannot be repeated enough. The demographics are destiny thesis seems to attract Democrats like moths to a flame. We saw it in the bowdlerization of (ahem) The Emerging Democratic Majority argument and we’re seeing it today in the enshrinement of generational change as the engine of certain Democratic dominance. Rising pro-Democratic generations = larger share of voters over time = Democratic dominance.
We’ve been here before with the rise of nonwhite voters. Here’s how the argument is being repurposed: if voter groups favorable to the Democrats (racial minorities, now younger generations) are growing while unfavorable groups (whites, now older generations) are declining, that’s good news for the Democrats. This is called a “mix effectâ€: a change in electoral margins attributable to the changing mix of voters.
and
In short, there’s no free (demographic) lunch. The boring, tedious, difficult task of persuasion is still the key to building electoral majorities. So maybe instead of blowing off these polls that show poor support for Democrats among young voters, they should take them seriously and get to work.
I think his advice is in vain. As Jonathan Swift observed 300 years ago it is useless to attempt to reason anyone out of a thing they were never reasoned into. Position are being drawn from premises and the premises themselves are unprovable.
There is another risk to the hypothesis that demographics is destiny. It is an observed phenomenon that changes in life circumstances have an effect on voting patterns. Once a Democrat, always a Democrat is not nearly as true as it once was.
Occurs to me that it’s one thing to favor Liberal positions when you are comfortably retired or as you say, in a position of sinecure, younger Americans feel insecure financially, mostly renters, paycheck to paycheck, gig work, no pension in the offing, nonexistent benefits, student loan debt, and such.
Now I can already hear the chorus shouting, “these are the choices they made, no free lunch”, doesn’t matter. The mood is gloomy, Liberals have made their living offering charity with other people’s money. That’s a hard sell to an electorate without money.
Doesn’t resonate with my comment on frugality? Well, both are true. This is the world we sold them, immigrants heard the siren song, and there really is no free lunch in perpetuity.
I believe the young generation will dig in their heels against an unfair (as they see it) system and since they are economically illiterate, are ripe fruit for a demagogue who speaks to their interests.
No. Not Trump.
It’s hard to make sweeping generalizations about large groups. Gen-Z currently comprises about 68 million individuals in the US, which is the same number as the entire population of France.
Therefore, I am extremely skeptical of any claims about their political views and voting habits in the future.
And yet the survival of political parties and careers of politicians depends upon doing just that.
Some of them will guess correctly or be more attuned and nimble to change and thereby benefit, and others won’t. At 55 I am not “old” but am old enough that such machinations are of little interest to me.