While pollsters crunch numbers and pundits predict who’ll win in November based on whether they’re for or against homosexual “marriage” and child killing, favor an open border or border fence, are hard or soft on Islamofascism, and promise to raise or lower taxes, politicians may want to consider a couple of issues that often aren’t discussed.
As a rule of thumb, married people with children tend to be more right-leaning than single and/or childless people. There are exceptions, of course, and I am one. I’m single and childless, and I’m more conservative than most conservatives, socially and fiscally. But generally, being married with children correlates more strongly with voting for Republicans.
USA Today published two related stories Marriage gap could sway elections and “Fertility gap” helps explain political divide: From the marriage piece:
Republicans control 49 of the 50 districts with the highest rates of married people…Democrats represent all 50 districts that have the highest rates of adults who have never married.
The political tug-of-war is between people who are married and those who have never been…The “never married” group covers a variety of groups who form the Democratic base: young people, those who marry late in life, single parents, gays, and heterosexuals who live together.
The marriage divide drew attention in the 2004 presidential race. President Bush beat John Kerry by 15 percentage points among married people and lost by 18 percentage points among unmarried people, according to an exit poll conducted by national news media organizations…Most serious Democratic challenges this fall are in Republican-controlled House districts that have lower marriage rates.
Generally, Republicans tout the “traditional values” line while Democrats are much more…what’s the right word? Non-traditional? Permissive? I’ve heard it said that as people marry, buy property, and age, they tend to become more conservative, not more liberal.
Think about it. Housing is cheaper in “fly over country” than in urban centers. Single homeowners in the city may be worried about crime and are paying an arm and a couple of legs for housing, but the lifestyle is cost-prohibitive once they’re married with children (unless they’re rich). Kids cost money, I’ve heard, and most parents would do anything to keep their kids safe. So, off to the suburbs or “exurbs” they go. Not only are the suburbs safer, generally speaking, they’re cheaper. And people who own property are keenly aware of the tax implications; therefore, they tend to vote for the candidate who promises lower taxes. Chances are, he/she won’t be a Democrat.
Most of us don’t need studies and charts to confirm any of this, but it helps. From the fertility article:
GOP Congress members represent 39.2 million children younger than 18, about 7 million more than Democrats. Republicans average 7,000 more children per district.
Many Democrats represent areas that have many single people and relatively few children. Democratic districts that have large numbers of children tend to be predominantly Hispanic or, to a lesser extent, African-American.
This “fertility gap” is crucial to understanding the differences between liberals and conservatives, says Arthur Brooks, a professor of public administration at Syracuse University. These childbearing patterns shape divisions over issues such as welfare, education and child tax credits, he says.
James Taranto of the Opinion Journal offered a “Roe Effect” theory to argue that Democrats, the pro-child killing party, are killing off their voting bloc.
In 2004, Steve Sailer wrote about the marriage and baby gap between red state voters and blue state voters. About the stronger relationship between marriage/fertility and voting for Republicans, he writes:
“Why do voters follow these patterns? Because blue regions tend to be more densely populated and racially diverse—which raises the cost of both capacious housing and safe schooling. This makes children harder to afford. Bigger families make red staters more open to voting on the GOP’s ‘family values’ issues.”
He explains in the baby gap article why he focused on white families:
“I’ll focus primarily on Caucasians, who overall voted for Bush 58-41, in part because they are doing most of the arguing over the meaning of the red-blue division. The reasons blacks vote Democratic are obvious, and other racial blocs are smaller. Whites remain the 800-pound gorilla of ethnic electoral groups, accounting for over three out of every four votes.”
Again, these are generalizations. I remember reading a story about voting patterns among married-with-children blacks, and the numbers weren’t similar in any way to voting patterns among their white counterparts. Blacks vote for Democrats in high numbers (Dems get about 90 percent of the black vote), and marriage, parenthood, and suburban living are less predictive for them.
{ 11 comments }
I think the whole idea that liberals are diminishing their voting power by not having offspring is hysterically funny. Yay!!!! Same thing is true of liberal, self-hating Jews who reflect badly on the rest of us — they tend not to have Jewish children, or not to have children at all, so in effect, are assimilating themselves out of existence. Pretty soon we won’t have to worry about their negative effect on our community.
All Gd-fearing people, have patience and hang in there — we will win in the end because we nurture life and our numbers reflect that.
I remember reading a story about voting patterns among married-with-children blacks, and the numbers weren’t similar in any way to voting patterns among their white counterparts. Blacks vote for Democrats in high numbers (Dems get about 90 percent of the black vote), and marriage, parenthood, and suburban living are less predictive for them.
This point was argued extensively in an earlier thread. Many, many blacks don’t vote Republican, not because of specific issues and what ideals Republican’s represent, but because of a preconceived, strongly engraved perception that Republicans are don’t like blacks. This is why blacks with diverse views and from all walks of life tend to vote the same way.
We just found “Hitch” in the sale bin so we watched it; I’m not much for rom-coms, but this one was very sweet.
I wish we had a Hitch, LaShawn, to make that perfect man happen for you. I guess this is selfish, because I want you to pass on your wisdom and humor and snappin’ smart DNA to your offspring so they can grow up, find MY kids, and marry them!
The military has been a great career path for many blacks. There is a huge “old boys” network of black former military people who are quietly cherry picking the best and the brightest of recent retirees. Most of these people tend to be conservative. It is not a rule, nor is it a wishful generalization.
There is a fast growing group of upwardly mobile black professionals with military backgrounds who are going to permanently alter the grasp on voting of the black democrat status quo.
Why is the military background so important? It rewards merit and treats “victim status” complaints with a severe dose of “prove it or shove off.” The Inspector General is available for a further redress of grievances, but in the final analysis, you are judged by what you do rather than what you claim.
LaShawn,
Good point about the correlation between marriage w/children and voting republican. The exception is the minority vote. Muslims and Mexicans though not similar ideologically both have lots of kids. In my area, I rarely see a Mexican family with less than 4 kids. Muslims, because many are polygamists, have lots of kids. Both tend to vote democrat, though this is changing amongst Mexicans. This is the inherent (sp?) foolishness of the open-border Republicanism we’ve seen of late, as both Mexicans and Muslims are immigrant voters that don’t vote Republican.
Just another thought(crime).
It’s weird though that the lowest divorce rates are in the liberal northeast, and the highest divorce rates are in bible belt.
Also, from personal experiences, most of my liberal friends are personally very traditional and socially conservative. They all married young, their spouse was their first partner, and they all had children at a young age.
A lot of the conservative women I know from work and through other friends seem to follow the individualism path: “Why should my tax payer money pay for someone else’s health care,” with that individualistic path also leading them to generally only care about themselves, as they’ve all saved up for breast implants, they don’t want to be tied down to a man, and they think that having kids will distort their bodies. This seems to follow the current trend of the red blooded american male who wants to keep his tax dollars, but then also takes that aspect of individualism into the personal realm, by expecting a trophy girflriend with Pamela Anderson like assets, and not caring to have children or getting married.
When I look at most of the Republican voters I know, I see a real disconnect between the economic individualism espoused by libertarian conservatives, and the advancement of a cultural common good based on Christianity espoused by social conservatives. Almost all of the Republicans I know don’t care about homosexuality, abortion, promiscuity, or family values, with their exclusive concern focusing on tax cuts. THey vote Republican because as they say “they’re only getting the nut cases to vote for our tax cuts, they aren’t actually going to act on what those nutcases want.”
I wonder if Christian Conservatives realize that they are being used, or are they blind to that fact that GOP legislators almost exclusively pursue a platform of economic freedom.
I also wonder, how do you encourage someone to maximize profits and encourage individuality through economic freedom, but then also pressure individuals to conform to you’re definition of the cultural common good by restricting their personal freedom? The same could also be asked to liberals with the conditions reversed. Additionally, why is the environment not considered a part of the cultural common good?
I always see liberals getting accused of destroying morals, but I realy think it is the fact that sex sells so well in america that is the downfall of traditional values. Most corporations/ individuals have realized it is a great way to maximize profits, seeing that it has engulfed all phases of society. To pretend like only liberals or democrats are selling and purchasing sex, is ridiculous.
#6 familyvaluesvoter knows only this type of conservative women: “they’ve all saved up for breast implants, they don’t want to be tied down to a man, and they think that having kids will distort their bodies.”
Does anyone have a Dr. Phil type contact for “familyvaluesvoter” and the twitchy-butt conservative women that surround him/her?
Whew!
Heliotrope, I think ‘familyvaluesvoter’, when posting at DK probably goes with a moniker like:
‘dethBushdie’ or ‘raginlib’. Here they try to sound oh! so moderate and clear thinking. Nope.
LSB – I believe the saying runs along the lines: “If by 20 you’re not a communist – you have no heart. If by 40 you’re not a capitalist – you have no head”
(You can swap in Lib/Conservative – but the 2 ‘c’ words have a nicer ring. And I’m australian – look up the australian “Liberal Party”.
If divorce rates are lower in the liberal NE, it’s probably because those folks don’t bother to get married in the first place, ya think?
Possibly, Batyah, but there is no evidence to support that. If you have any, please bring it forward.
Comments on this entry are closed.