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franzkafka
Jun 30, 2006

kafkabot mk. II: stronger, faster & more alienated
Center for American Progress, Brookings and the American Enterprise Institute put out this report last year, looking at American election demographic data from the 1970s to projections into 2060, to get an idea of what the changing electorate will look like.

The major racial trends include:

White people are proportionally declining like polar bears... 80% of the total population in 1980, 63% in 2015 and projected to be <44% in 2060.

Latin Americans are blowing up. 6% in 1980, 17% in 2015 and into 2060 they are expected to reach almost 30% of the total pop.

Asians / others are steadily growing. From 2% in 1980, 8% in 2015 and 15% in 2060.

Maryland and Nevada are slated to be the next "Majority Minority" states and should flip in the next 5 years. The 2020s will see four more: Arizona, Florida, Georgia, and New Jersey. Eventually 22 more states are expected to be majority minority by 2060, accounting for roughly 2/3 of the U.S. population and the vast majority of the electoral college votes (11/15 of the largest states).

The major trends with voter eligibility:

There has always been a gap between the population share of minorities and those of them that are eligible to vote. In 1980, 16% of eligible voters were minorities, 4% less than the total population of minorities in the country. The gap between minority population and voter eligibility has risen to 7% in 2015, but is expected to narrow over the next 45 years to 2%. This narrowing is partially due to natural citizenship being granted to the children of immigrants who themselves are currently not citizens.



The actual voting populace is also becoming more diverse.

Eligible voters and actual voters are different stats entirely, as minorities have historically been underrepresented among actual voters. For instance, in 1975 15% of eligible voters were minorities compared to 12% of actual voters. The 3% gap has remained constant up to 2012.

There is also a gap depending on what type of election you are talking about. Minorities tend to vote less in congressional elections as opposed to presidential years. The gap in 2006, 2010 and 2014 was around 5% as opposed to the average of 3%.

Baby Boomers are becoming less and less electorally relevant.

By 2015, the Greatest Generation was down to around 1%, the Silent Generation was at 9%, Baby Boomers were at 24%, and Gen Xers were at 21%. However, the Millennials—born from 1981 to 2000—had grown to 27%, and the Post-Millennials—born from 2001 to 2010—had grown to 18%.

The boomers will be dead in 2060, barring some transhuman breakthrough:



America is getting older because the newer generations are smaller than the boomers.

Back in 1980, 49% of the population was under age 30, but now its 40% and is projected to decline to 35% in 2060.

Most importantly, in my mind, is the trend showing the white working class declining over the historical data and even more into the future projections. Defined as white people with less than 4 years of college education, in 1974, 73% of all eligible voters were white working class. Over the next 40 years, that figure dropped 27 points to 46% in 2015.

This group has been declining at a steady rate of 3 points per presidential election, a trend that is expected to continue. This group also disproportionately breaks for Trump this cycle, by as much as +40%. On the other hand, these voters are disproportionately located in solid red states.

Young people are disproportionately independent and democratic according to Gallups 2014 numbers:


But they are also the most disconnected from politics. Almost half of millennials identify as independent.

Check out what Pew came up with in late 2015 when they polled party identification by race:

It stands to reason that after Trump's wall, the Trump U. Judge and the Muslim ban, the +30 for the dems in the Latino column will increase. Maybe for as long as a generation.

Of the groups that tilt to the dems only two are not growing rapidly, black americans and jewish americans... their numbers are expected to stay steady into 2060.

So, TL:DR = however you cut the electorate, demographically, the groups that traditionally have skewed to the right politically are shrinking and the groups that skew left are being further alienated by the current campaign.

The stats paint with a broad brush and cover over nuances that are important, but the overall trends are clearly bad for the GOP. The post-mortem post-Romney was pretty clear on these points and included specific proscriptions to change with the times.

However, Trump has pretty much done the opposite of all of them.

The governor of Cali in 1991 pulled the same move with his hardcore support for Proposition 187. In the face of a rising Latino electorate, republican governor Pete Wilson ran this ad, lovingly dubbed "they keep coming." The GOP doesn't win there anymore.

This was going to happen nationally---the K-street facility is on fire, but Trump has been the metaphorical equivalent of air-dropping gasoline in place of water. The real question is whether or not Paul Ryan, Rubio, Kasich and other remaining moderish voices in the RNC can build a new coalition that can compete nationally in the face of these changing demographics and right after the Trump train derails their national strategy Lac Megantic style.

Seems like we should say a few words... adios seems appropriate. :abuela: Enjoyed Will Ferrell's incredibly prescient impression of what will be the last republican president.

franzkafka fucked around with this message at 14:36 on Jul 27, 2016

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4th Horseman
Jun 3, 2011
I'm sure the GOP will do nothing when faced with such electoral Armageddon.

OneEightHundred
Feb 28, 2008

Soon, we will be unstoppable!

franzkafka posted:

It stands to reason that after Trump's wall, the Trump U. Judge and the Muslim ban, the +30 for the dems in the Latino column will increase. Maybe for as long as a generation.
I think that's failing to recognize how much of Trump's campaign is built on pure shock value. Future candidates are probably not going to do that sort of thing as much because it flat-out isn't going to work the second time around.

In spite of that though, I think that the success of Trump is going to lead to a realignment of the GOP at least at the national level. He's illustrated ways that the GOP can make inroads among younger, non-religious, and gay voters without pissing off its existing base, and he's led it in a more populist direction that could pry low-income voters away from the Democrats.

Also, "independents" are a garbage stat that means the pollsters should be asking better questions. Most independents actually have highly partisan voting patterns, and there has been heavy tilt within it among several election cycles (i.e. the Tea Party poo poo led to a huge influx of "independents" that overwhelmingly voted Republican).

OneEightHundred fucked around with this message at 17:17 on Jul 27, 2016

Ytlaya
Nov 13, 2005

quote:

Defined as white people with less than 4 years of college education, in 1974, 73% of all eligible voters were white working class. Over the next 40 years, that figure dropped 27 points to 46% in 2015.

It seems like this is a really bad definition of working class. College education has had less of an influence on a person's income as time has passed (at least in terms of ensuring they become middle class or above), largely due to so many more people going to college. It seems a lot more reasonable to just define it using income.

edit: The statistic probably made sense back in 1974, when a college education did a lot more to ensure someone ends up with a decent job (though even then it still seems like it would have been more simple to use income).

Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 17:07 on Jul 27, 2016

gobbagool
Feb 5, 2016

by R. Guyovich
Doctor Rope

franzkafka posted:

Center for American Progress, Brookings and the American Enterprise Institute put out this report last year, looking at American election demographic data from the 1970s to projections into 2060, to get an idea of what the changing electorate will look like.

The major racial trends include:

White people are proportionally declining like polar bears... 80% of the total population in 1980, 63% in 2015 and projected to be <44% in 2060.

Latin Americans are blowing up. 6% in 1980, 17% in 2015 and into 2060 they are expected to reach almost 30% of the total pop.

Asians / others are steadily growing. From 2% in 1980, 8% in 2015 and 15% in 2060.

Maryland and Nevada are slated to be the next "Majority Minority" states and should flip in the next 5 years. The 2020s will see four more: Arizona, Florida, Georgia, and New Jersey. Eventually 22 more states are expected to be majority minority by 2060, accounting for roughly 2/3 of the U.S. population and the vast majority of the electoral college votes (11/15 of the largest states).

The major trends with voter eligibility:

There has always been a gap between the population share of minorities and those of them that are eligible to vote. In 1980, 16% of eligible voters were minorities, 4% less than the total population of minorities in the country. The gap between minority population and voter eligibility has risen to 7% in 2015, but is expected to narrow over the next 45 years to 2%. This narrowing is partially due to natural citizenship being granted to the children of immigrants who themselves are currently not citizens.



The actual voting populace is also becoming more diverse.

Eligible voters and actual voters are different stats entirely, as minorities have historically been underrepresented among actual voters. For instance, in 1975 15% of eligible voters were minorities compared to 12% of actual voters. The 3% gap has remained constant up to 2012.

There is also a gap depending on what type of election you are talking about. Minorities tend to vote less in congressional elections as opposed to presidential years. The gap in 2006, 2010 and 2014 was around 5% as opposed to the average of 3%.

Baby Boomers are becoming less and less electorally relevant.

By 2015, the Greatest Generation was down to around 1%, the Silent Generation was at 9%, Baby Boomers were at 24%, and Gen Xers were at 21%. However, the Millennials—born from 1981 to 2000—had grown to 27%, and the Post-Millennials—born from 2001 to 2010—had grown to 18%.

The boomers will be dead in 2060, barring some transhuman breakthrough:



America is getting older because the newer generations are smaller than the boomers.

Back in 1980, 49% of the population was under age 30, but now its 40% and is projected to decline to 35% in 2060.

Most importantly, in my mind, is the trend showing the white working class declining over the historical data and even more into the future projections. Defined as white people with less than 4 years of college education, in 1974, 73% of all eligible voters were white working class. Over the next 40 years, that figure dropped 27 points to 46% in 2015.

This group has been declining at a steady rate of 3 points per presidential election, a trend that is expected to continue. This group also disproportionately breaks for Trump this cycle, by as much as +40%. On the other hand, these voters are disproportionately located in solid red states.

Young people are disproportionately independent and democratic according to Gallups 2014 numbers:


But they are also the most disconnected from politics. Almost half of millennials identify as independent.

Check out what Pew came up with in late 2015 when they polled party identification by race:

It stands to reason that after Trump's wall, the Trump U. Judge and the Muslim ban, the +30 for the dems in the Latino column will increase. Maybe for as long as a generation.

Of the groups that tilt to the dems only two are not growing rapidly, black americans and jewish americans... their numbers are expected to stay steady into 2060.

So, TL:DR = however you cut the electorate, demographically, the groups that traditionally have skewed to the right politically are shrinking and the groups that skew left are being further alienated by the current campaign.

The stats paint with a broad brush and cover over nuances that are important, but the overall trends are clearly bad for the GOP. The post-mortem post-Romney was pretty clear on these points and included specific proscriptions to change with the times.

However, Trump has pretty much done the opposite of all of them.

The governor of Cali in 1991 pulled the same move with his hardcore support for Proposition 187. In the face of a rising Latino electorate, republican governor Pete Wilson ran this ad, lovingly dubbed "they keep coming." The GOP doesn't win there anymore.

This was going to happen nationally---the K-street facility is on fire, but Trump has been the metaphorical equivalent of air-dropping gasoline in place of water. The real question is whether or not Paul Ryan, Rubio, Kasich and other remaining moderish voices in the RNC can build a new coalition that can compete nationally in the face of these changing demographics and right after the Trump train derails their national strategy Lac Megantic style.

Seems like we should say a few words... adios seems appropriate. :abuela: Enjoyed Will Ferrell's incredibly prescient impression of what will be the last republican president.

Well if we know one thing, all statistical trends extrapolate in a linear manor, forever, and nothing ever changes. Clearly a coalition of the ultra wealthy coastal liberals, upper middle class highly educated knowledge workers, and working class 2nd generation and beyond immigrants will always hold together because they have 100% common goals! I bet Donald Trump finishes with negative electoral votes!

computer parts
Nov 18, 2010

PLEASE CLAP

OneEightHundred posted:


In spite of that though, I think that the success of Trump is going to lead to a realignment of the GOP at least at the national level. He's illustrated ways that the GOP can make inroads among younger, non-religious, and gay voters without pissing off its existing base, and he's led it in a more populist direction that could pry low-income voters away from the Democrats.
Can you prove he actually did do this? The only people I've seen support him are poor whites with little education, which isn't exactly a new or growing demographic.

gobbagool
Feb 5, 2016

by R. Guyovich
Doctor Rope

computer parts posted:

Can you prove he actually did do this? The only people I've seen support him are poor whites with little education, which isn't exactly a new or growing demographic.

you are contending that Trump's only support are poor whites with little education.

franzkafka
Jun 30, 2006

kafkabot mk. II: stronger, faster & more alienated

gobbagool posted:

Well if we know one thing, all statistical trends extrapolate in a linear manor, forever, and nothing ever changes. Clearly a coalition of the ultra wealthy coastal liberals, upper middle class highly educated knowledge workers, and working class 2nd generation and beyond immigrants will always hold together because they have 100% common goals! I bet Donald Trump finishes with negative electoral votes!

This is real.

There are a million variables that are not contended with at all in the research posted above that make it hard to project out as far as 2060, its akin to predicting the weather this day next year... but I see credence in the argument that Trump could be the Barry Goldwater of those that identify as latino.

All of this is not to mention that the definition of "white" has changed so much it would be unrecognizable to a vaudvillian from the early 1900s. Irish and Italian immigrants were not in the fold back then and I wonder if at least a subset of latino americans will follow a similar path to the idea of white.

I think that the racial boxes that we put people into today are malleable at the least, so maybe this rising ethnic multiplicity will just end up where we started with a majority of "white" americans.

I see real weaknesses in the emerging coalitions on both sides.

With respect to the dems, the National Review had a great article on the "Coalition of the Ascendant" that supposedly elected Obama twice, and there are divergent interests in both:

National Review posted:

In particular, “non-whites” are an inevitably increasing share of the electorate, and Clinton strategists expect that share to grow from 28 percent in 2012 to 31 percent next year. But “non-whites” are not a cohesive or uniform bloc. Blacks, Hispanics, and Asians act, think, and vote differently.

Young people, latinos, african americans, asian americans and educated whites have differing interests when it comes to jobs and the economy generally, which seems to permeate as the issue in most elections. I think it will be particularly easy for the future post-Trump GOP to poach latin votes via religiously conservative policies that align protestants and catholics.

On the GOP side, the coalition of "working class" whites, evangelicals and big business is already fraying at the edges... there are too many examples to count. The GOP will mutate, its just not clear to me what coalition can or will be built out of the ashes.

Samuel Clemens
Oct 4, 2013

I think we should call the Avengers.

franzkafka posted:

Young people, latinos, african americans, asian americans and educated whites have differing interests when it comes to jobs and the economy generally, which seems to permeate as the issue in most elections. I think it will be particularly easy for the future post-Trump GOP to poach latin votes via religiously conservative policies that align protestants and catholics.

Aren't these two sentences contradictory? You first assert that economic policies are the primary issue for minorities, but then you argue that the GOP will attract Hispanics through social policies.

sean10mm
Jun 29, 2005

It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, MAD-2R World
The problem for the GOP is that targeting mad white males using racism and sexism is a bad national strategy, but it serves them really well in many states - and will continue to for a long time. So they somehow need to turn into a believably not-racist, not-sexist national party while half the states run sanitized white power candidates for almost every elected office for the foreseeable future.

The smart long-term move is to purge the racists and move to the middle, but they depend on white human garbage :heritage: voters now, and there is no good way to make that transition in the short term, and politicians only care about the short term so they're trapped. The Democrats split over the Civil Rights Act in the 1960s, and all the racists quit and it totally hosed them from 1968-1992 outside 1 term of Carter. Plus the primary electorate skews to the right of the Republican base, never mind the rest of the country, so any attempt to move to the center is stymied by that fact as well.

franzkafka
Jun 30, 2006

kafkabot mk. II: stronger, faster & more alienated

Samuel Clemens posted:

Aren't these two sentences contradictory? You first assert that economic policies are the primary issue for minorities, but then you argue that the GOP will attract Hispanics through social policies.

I think economic arguments apply more broadly but both.

computer parts
Nov 18, 2010

PLEASE CLAP

gobbagool posted:

you are contending that Trump's only support are poor whites with little education.

His only new support (even then it's not very new), yes.

Specifically, i want him to prove that Trump is actually appealing to "younger, non-religious, and gay voters".


franzkafka posted:

All of this is not to mention that the definition of "white" has changed so much it would be unrecognizable to a vaudvillian from the early 1900s. Irish and Italian immigrants were not in the fold back then and I wonder if at least a subset of latino americans will follow a similar path to the idea of white.


Here's the flaw in this line of logic: Hispanics were trying to become white at the same time as the Irish & Italians. It didn't stick for reasons completely unique to them.

Of course if you're going to use weasel words like "at least a subset" I can point you to Rafael Cruz as an example of someone who's already done that.

Frogfingers
Oct 10, 2012
The GOP can't gamble on courting new demographics. It's painted a very particular picture about the world outside of red states to the point if they risked courting new people into the club they would be alienating the base they already have. Their only option is to sit and grind away at whatever they have left to count on before that evaporates. Attempting to court new members might kill their party off faster than letting their current base dwindle to insignificance.

It's a hole they've dug for themselves. It's far, far easier to not vote in the US than it should be, and it's definitely GOP doing that has made this the case.

franzkafka
Jun 30, 2006

kafkabot mk. II: stronger, faster & more alienated

Frogfingers posted:

The GOP can't gamble on courting new demographics. It's painted a very particular picture about the world outside of red states to the point if they risked courting new people into the club they would be alienating the base they already have. Their only option is to sit and grind away at whatever they have left to count on before that evaporates. Attempting to court new members might kill their party off faster than letting their current base dwindle to insignificance.

It's a hole they've dug for themselves. It's far, far easier to not vote in the US than it should be, and it's definitely GOP doing that has made this the case.

This is right (and the reason behind the parenthetical after the thread title).

However, look at the "inroads" that Trump has made with the LGBTQ community! He said "LGBTQ" a few times at the convention. He got applause for saying that he would protect them from terrorism during his tirade to a room full of the basiest dogmatics at the convention.

I guess what I'm saying is that he has been reaching out and it hasn't hurt him yet in the way you would expect. I have this theory that it is because the gays aren't perceived to be brown...

Nessus
Dec 22, 2003

After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!



Will future electoral demographics be able to tolerate such lovely JPG artifacting or whatever the hell is going on in your charts/graphs

Axetrain
Sep 14, 2007

franzkafka posted:

This is right (and the reason behind the parenthetical after the thread title).

However, look at the "inroads" that Trump has made with the LGBTQ community! He said "LGBTQ" a few times at the convention. He got applause for saying that he would protect them from terrorism during his tirade to a room full of the basiest dogmatics at the convention.

I guess what I'm saying is that he has been reaching out and it hasn't hurt him yet in the way you would expect. I have this theory that it is because the gays aren't perceived to be brown...

Well other then those Logcabin Republican fools I don't think anyone in the LGBTQ community is going to actually consider those to be inroads. It's like that Trump tacobowl tweet, Latino's aren't going to vote for someone very openly hostile towards them just because Trump ate some fake Mexican food. And they can't make actual inroads towards anyone because their hate fueled base absolutely despises it or any compromise at all for that matter. Even if their base did tolerate outreach to other groups of people (they very much don't), the people the GOP have been making GBS threads on for decades now aren't going to just forget because of some empty platitudes. I guess you already understand this but the reason that his "outreach" hasn't hurt him with his base is because they know it's just one or two meaningless words.

Shbobdb
Dec 16, 2010

by Reene
The collapse of the Reagan Coalition and the failures of Neoconservativism means that the Republican Party is due for a major realignment. Post realignment there will be some old school hangers on but they'll be the exception not the rule.

The question is what will this realignment look like? Because of their strong base in flyover and the South, they are unlikely to ditch racism as part of their platform.

That's assuming that controlling the house and every other Senate session isn't good enough. They could just wait it out until the Democrats neoliberal executive platform wears people out and the American people vote to throw the bums out, like they did with Gore.

tsa
Feb 3, 2014
A little over a decade ago posters here were predicting the death of the democratic party. Years before that is was the Republicans. The garbage in the op is the same trite nonsense that never comes to fruition because poo poo changes in unpredictable ways over the long run. Who would have predicted brexit and Europe's swing to the right 10 years ago? No one that's who.

Meanwhile in the real world the US race is neck and neck, so much for demographics.

gobbagool posted:

Well if we know one thing, all statistical trends extrapolate in a linear manor, forever, and nothing ever changes. Clearly a coalition of the ultra wealthy coastal liberals, upper middle class highly educated knowledge workers, and working class 2nd generation and beyond immigrants will always hold together because they have 100% common goals! I bet Donald Trump finishes with negative electoral votes!

Ding ding ding, this is why you don't let social 'scientists' touch statistics, though the results are always amusing at least!



Edit: remember last election when the dems were totally going to have a chance at Texas only to get destroyed by even bigger margins? Woops!

tsa fucked around with this message at 21:34 on Jul 29, 2016

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

tsa posted:

Who would have predicted brexit and Europe's swing to the right 10 years ago? No one that's who.
Brexit, probably not. (Though I think people would have said it was not entirely impossible if you had asked them.) Europe's swing to the right? Haha, yeah, no way would anyone have predicted something that was clearly already taking place at the time. I mean, it started more than a decade before and was still picking up steam.

A Buttery Pastry fucked around with this message at 05:44 on Jul 30, 2016

computer parts
Nov 18, 2010

PLEASE CLAP

tsa posted:

Edit: remember last election when the dems were totally going to have a chance at Texas only to get destroyed by even bigger margins? Woops!

I don't remember people saying that in 2012, no.

Yinlock
Oct 22, 2008

tsa posted:

A little over a decade ago posters here were predicting the death of the democratic party. Years before that is was the Republicans. The garbage in the op is the same trite nonsense that never comes to fruition because poo poo changes in unpredictable ways over the long run. Who would have predicted brexit and Europe's swing to the right 10 years ago? No one that's who.

Meanwhile in the real world the US race is neck and neck, so much for demographics.


Ding ding ding, this is why you don't let social 'scientists' touch statistics, though the results are always amusing at least!



Edit: remember last election when the dems were totally going to have a chance at Texas only to get destroyed by even bigger margins? Woops!

the brexit and trump are not remotely comparable, the demographics and culture are significantly different

VitalSigns
Sep 3, 2011

franzkafka posted:

This is right (and the reason behind the parenthetical after the thread title).

However, look at the "inroads" that Trump has made with the LGBTQ community! He said "LGBTQ" a few times at the convention. He got applause for saying that he would protect them from terrorism during his tirade to a room full of the basiest dogmatics at the convention.

I guess what I'm saying is that he has been reaching out and it hasn't hurt him yet in the way you would expect. I have this theory that it is because the gays aren't perceived to be brown...

Trump brought a governor who championed a discriminate-against-the-gays bill in his state on for VP, and pledged to nominate the gay-hatingest judges he can find. Promising to kick out Arabs is not "reaching out" to the LGBT community, that's why it hasn't hurt him with his base. And also why he's not making any LGBT "inroads", Trump is losing LGBT people by similar margins as hispanics.

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Captain Oblivious
Oct 12, 2007

I'm not like other posters

tsa posted:

A little over a decade ago posters here were predicting the death of the democratic party. Years before that is was the Republicans. The garbage in the op is the same trite nonsense that never comes to fruition because poo poo changes in unpredictable ways over the long run. Who would have predicted brexit and Europe's swing to the right 10 years ago? No one that's who.

Meanwhile in the real world the US race is neck and neck, so much for demographics.


Ding ding ding, this is why you don't let social 'scientists' touch statistics, though the results are always amusing at least!



Edit: remember last election when the dems were totally going to have a chance at Texas only to get destroyed by even bigger margins? Woops!

There's a lot of dumb poo poo in this post but I'll stick to the more pertinent stuff.

A) Europe has been moving rightwards for a while now.
B) The US presidential election is not neck and neck by every readily available metric
C) When people talk about the death of the GOP in this thread they are not saying the GOP will cease to exist. Rather, demographic changes mean that the GOP will be forced to redefine itself in order to survive. The question isn't so much IF they do this but when and how. Either way what is born from that process will likely be a new party in all but name.

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