Andrew Gelman looks at voting patterns by education and income for white voters.
The wealthy in all income groups, except for those with a graduate degree, vote Republican. The wealthy in the graduate degree group are split between the two parties. Those with graduate degrees who make lower and mid-level incomes vote for Democrats.
Yet, it is the out of touch elites that are reported to ruin the country. To vote for the left. If by out of touch elites, one means college professors making $60,000-$80,000, maybe you can make a case, but those with the money, the ones living in the gated communities and running the country, are much more likely to be affiliated with the GOP.
The whole schtick about the elites has never quite made sense to me. It has always felt much more like a bogeyman, made up so people can have someone to be angry at. It seems to fulfill a need for tribal expression. A good way to avoid confronting important issues.
Politics is nothing but boogeymen. The rich Republican shtick makes no sense either. Look at the richest members of Congress. Seven of the top ten are Democrats, but it evens out after than. When I think of the elite, I think of the political class and wealth. My view of the elites is more narrow.
I don’t see enough information in the charts to make any sort of generalization about college professors. There are lots of graduate degrees, like you and I, out there that aren’t college professors. More than are college professors. This info at OpenSecrets.org clearly indicated that the education industry favors Democrats and there’s no info there that implies that colleges and professors think differently.
Your charts indicate to me that, the poor, wanting more government support or just freebies support Democrats because that’s what Democrats sell, and that the more ttime a person spends in college, getting indoctirnated into the left wing mind set, the more likely they are to vote Democratic.
But, the purpose here isn’t to openly explore voting patterns., or the elite, but to disseminate propaganda that reflects favorably upon the Democrats.
and that the more ttime a person spends in college, getting indoctirnated into the left wing mind set, the more likely they are to vote Democratic.
I meant this of professors in particular, not from the charts, which don’t indicate that.
“Your charts indicate to me that, the poor, wanting more government support or just freebies support Democrats because that’s what Democrats sell”
Interesting. 5 of the 6 charts show the majority of people in the GOP column, pretty strongly correlating with increased income.
“But, the purpose here isn’t to openly explore voting patterns., or the elite, but to disseminate propaganda that reflects favorably upon the Democrats.”
The numbers are what they are.
Steve
The numbers are what they are.
LOL. The numbers are created by a person with an agenda to confirm what that person wants to confirm using great leaps in logic. There is nothing in those numbers with which to make the college professor/elitist conclusion. Elitism is more of a mental state than a financial state. I know wealthy people who are down to earth and in touch with people of all socioeconomic levels. I know people who make much less than me who are convinced they are one of the elite few who have special insight into the world, our state of being, human consciousness, or whatever.
Reminds me of two sayings: “Lies, Damn lies and statistics” or “Liars figure and figures lie.” Take your pick.
My good Steve,
Your charts purport to represent only voting patterns by income and education.
It is you and you alone here who has decided that those are the sole factors defining “elites”, and in particular, the claimed “out of touch elites” you wish to build your artificially engineered argument against.
It may be that, as a socially isolated individual living in a medical bubble, seeing predominantly only other highly paid medical professionals and desperately sick people (does this qualify one as an “out of touch ‘elite’”?) you do not recognize that, according to the criteria you have selected to represent “elites” you yourself have just become, by virtue of your vastly greater income and education, a blogger far more “elite” than, say, a Rod Dreher, who makes at best a low six figure income, has only a B.A., and hopes at best to last several more months at a declining, online-only magazine.
And yet it is Rod Dreher and his blogging visions, not you, whom David Brooks singles out for national attention in his column.
The problem, of course, is that the elites railed against as “out of touch” by the right are not the same as those railed against as “out of touch” by the left, and, in the end the “elite” demons of either side are certainly not defined solely by income or education.
It is the left, ironically, who will predominantly rail against Wall Street “fat cats” and mount Occupy movements against them; the “out of touch elites” that the right will rail against, although they may episodically invoke wealthy Hollywood, predominantly include middle income pundits and Washington bureaucrats.
In other words, for the right, it is far less the “elite”ness of wealth that is the problem for them than it is the “elite”ness of self-appointed savior-spokespersons, frequently technocratic, who have no end of solutions to everyone’s problems, if only the hoi polloi would heed their Platonic pronouncements as Guardians of all…at maybe $165K to $190K per year.
In sum, while your charts covering the voting patterns by income and education should be of interest to all, to use those criteria to define “elites” in the political context you wish to criticize presents you as having a demonstrably tin ear with respect to popular culture.
H. M. Stuart
Alexandria
IOW, the elite are a poorly defined group useful to rail against for political purposes.
Steve
IOW, the elite are a poorly defined group useful to rail against for political purposes.
Yes, precisely – by all comers. And “poorly defined” may even in fact credit more definition than the phenomena deserve.
To be sure, there are objectively elite performers, in sports, in business, in entertainment, even in political achievement – but these are never the demons being blamed.
The “elites” blamed, rather, seem nothing so much as projected objectifications of resentments: the hedge fund manager, whose 15% tax rate is somehow mysteriously responsible for one not getting a raise, again. That Adam Baldwin, who everyone seems to listen to instead of oneself. Those unnamed functionaries who wrote the PPACA their masters never read, because that’s what they were paid to do. That Andrew Breitbart, who got off his ass and actually did something, unlike many others.
In short, from what I see the common material of the resented “elites” seems to be not objectively chartable income or wealth or education per se, but rather perceived influence, real or not, in the face of perceived impotence, real and/or resigned to or not.
H. M. Stuart
Alexandria
“Your charts purport to represent only voting patterns by income and education.
“It is you and you alone here who has decided that those are the sole factors defining “elites”, and in particular, the claimed “out of touch elites” you wish to build your artificially engineered argument against.” (HMS)
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What’s more, income is NOT directly related to “wealth.”
There are virtually no “high income earners” among America’s “richest 1%” because income is perhaps the poorest generator of actual wealth.
The “truly rich” DO NOT rely at all on income for any sizable portion of their wealth.
Truly rich people like Bill Gates, Mike Bloomberg and Mark Cuban made virtually NONE of their fortunes via high incomes, they relied on much more powerful and reliable wealth generators.
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AND income is NOT always related to education. It is often related to how difficult it is to find people with the skill-level and the willingness to do certain work. In NYC a crane operator earns on average appx $500,000/year, a public school teacher with a Masters degree earns appx $110,000/year at top pay.
The fact is that crane operators are a LOT more rare (and thus more valuable) than are english, history, HS math and phys ed teachers.
So, it’s not surprising that “Those with graduate degrees who make lower and mid-level incomes vote for Democrats,” as most such people simply don’t understand how the world actually works! They “think” they’re underpaid relative to others…..like that crane operator? IF they only knew how much more arduous that crane operator’s job was they probably wouldn’t feel so underpaid.
One of the many tragedies of affluence is our mistaking education for intelligence. Those with the highest IQs tend to also have the highest rates of ADD, dyslexia, even bi-polar disorder, along with a significantly higher rate of things like visually photographic memories. Very few extremely bright or very creative people are ever “good students,” because they think too independently, tend NOT to be able to deal with the abject conformity of our educational factory system, etc.
What we wind up with then, is a LOT of people who believe they are extremely bright, when they are, in fact people of average intellect and very good focus, thus they think it unfair when more intelligent and more creative people find ways to build enterprises and forge fortunes their conformist minds can’t conceive of.
Still many highly educated people do find their way into relatively high-paying positions (not Mark Cuban-like positions) but high-paying, none-the-less, such as physicians, attorneys, etc.
BUT is it at all surprising to see people whose livelihoods are so interconnected with government (like medicine, banking & the law) supporting more government?
WHY would it be? After all, Wall Street has been among the biggest Dem donors for eons! Even that dolt Dinty…I mean Michael Moore has come to the ugly and inconvenient realization that “The Democrats are every bit as Corporatist, if not more so (it’s MORE SO Michael, unfortunately) than are the Republicans.” He noted that after finding out that President Obama’s two biggest financial supporters are BP (the oil giant) and Goldman Sachs.
I’ve said forever “There ARE NO “elites”
Certainly the likes of Mark Cuban, Mike Bloomberg and Bill Gates aren’t the so-called “educated elite,” they’re just much more creative! AND none of them forged their wealth via high incomes!
Likewise, there are few of the extremely bright among the so-called “educated elite.”
Most people never quite define the term “elite” because they really can’t define it. I say because there are no elites.
Gates went to Harvard. I trust you know his parentage.
“After all, Wall Street has been among the biggest Dem donors for eons!”
Historically, they mostly donate to the GOP. When the Democrat is the expected winner, they donate more to them. I dont really think Wall Street has an ideological/political leaning. They are interested in money.
Steve
Yes, Bill Gates dropped out of Harvard. I was thrown out of a perfectly nice (similar) institution in neighboring New Hampshire for the incompetence of others. I did go on to complete a B.S. in Biology and Psychology (majoring in physiological psychology), then later completed a Safety Engineering degee and one M.S. in Env Science and another in mathematics. I’m not among the “educated elite” either…whatever that may mean, NOR would Gates, be counted among “the educated elite” either, though he is clearly one of the most creative people around – he is probably among the brightest and most creative 0.005%, just as mark Cuban is.
The so-called “educated elite” are NOT “the intellectual elite” by any stretch, their disagreements on that notwithstanding.
Cuban’s best line is, “If you think you hate your 40-hour/week job, try my 120-hour/week one on for size.” Cuban slept in the offices where he first worked, scouring programming and software set-up books and eventually made himself into an installer doing contract consulting and set-up work, splitting the proceeds with the computer store he worked at. Folks like Bloomberg, Cuban & Gates created (invented) the means to their own success.
NONE of them relied on income for any significant portion of their wealth.
Wall Street has traditionally favored Democratic Corporatists (like Clinton and now the very malleable Obama) over Conservative Republicans or Democrats, though many have favored “Rockefeller-wing Republicans” most of all. Goldman Sachs (I believe Obama’s #1 contributor) has traditionally given about 80% of their donations to Dems and the rest to largely “Moderate/Rockefeller-wing Republicans,” BP, I believe, has a very similar political donation history.
Just like Dinty….uh…Michael Moore, I’m a lifelong registered Democrat and still part of the 480,000+ Tammany Hall contingent within that Party. Ideologically, I’m probably slightly to the “Right” of Pat Buchanan and very close to many of the views espoused by former GA Senator Zell Miller. While I commend Mr Moore for FINALLY coming to acknowledge the truth (BOTH major Parties are “bought & paid for” by Corporatist interests) I revile him because he still does not quite see the abject futility of any kind of “political solution.”
The primary flaw in your thesis here seems to be your misnaming “high-income earners” as the “wealthy.” It’s misleading given that none of the “truly wealthy” Americans have ever depended on income for any sizable portion of their wealth.
There are few, IF ANY “high income earners among the “Truly wealthy” in America, because income is the LEAST reliable generator of wealth.