The Contented Young? Hardly.
Michael Barone has a syndicated article in Townhall.com today that talks about young people as “The Contented Young.” He does a good job of noting the potentially significant role the youth vote can play in the next election given their size and the fact that they will be voting for a lot longer than older voters. Indeed, the sheer size of the Millennial Generation voters – 42 million citizens today and on track to be one-third of the electorate by 2015 – indicates that young voters will be a tremendous force in politics in 2008 and in future elections.
However, his argument that young people are content and that’s why they don’t vote is erroneous. First, young people ARE voting. The 2006 election was the second in a row in which the youth vote went up, increasing by two million voters over the last midterm election, a 25% increase. That came on the heels of the 2004 election, when turnout among 18-29 year olds increased by 4.3 million, or nine percentage points, over 2000 levels. The very youngest voters, 18-24, increased their turnout by 11 percentage points, nearly three times the overall electorate’s turnout increase (4 points). Young voters drove the nation’s high turnout in 2004.
Second, Barone uses Social Security as an example of young people’s “whatever” attitude and contentedness with the status quo. But Social Security is just one issue that, at the time of the debate, did indeed engage young activists. And when polled, young adults indicate that their top concerns include a number of crucial issues through which both Republicans and Democrats can reach out to this cohort, including jobs and the economy, the cost of college, Iraq, and health care.
According to a Young Voter Battleground Poll conducted by the bipartisan polling team of Ed Goeas of the Tarrance Group and Celinda Lake of Lake Research Partners, a plurality of young voters (39%) cast ballots in order to support a candidate or political party with whom they agreed on the issues. Forty-three percent of those surveyed named the war in Iraq as the most important issue when deciding who to vote for in 2006, followed by health care (37%), creating jobs (36%), and college affordability (31%).
Where does this leave Republicans? Today’s young adults are leaning Democratic currently, but Republicans shouldn’t and can’t throw up their hands and walk away. (As many top Republicans have said themselves, including top strategist Karl Rove) This generation is too big to walk away from and research indicates that partisanship is formed in early adulthood and remains significantly stable throughout life. If Republicans want to win tight elections now and regain power in the future, they need to court young people.
Not only must Republicans court young voters, there is a strong constituency of Republican and Independent young adults eager for outreach from the GOP. In 2006, 38% of 18-29 year olds voted for Republican congressional candidates – given that this age group will number more than 42 million in 2008, that’s a big bloc of potential voters. Further, according to 2006 polling, young Republicans were ten percentage points more likely than young Democrats to say they were “almost certain” to vote this past election or has already voted early. They were also strongly supportive of President Bush (83% approval, compared to 38% overall) and of the Republican Party. Republicans must continue to engage and energize GOP voters under 30.
Today, young voters are of the size and increasing propensity to vote that they can make the difference in close elections; ten years from now, they will be the base for the political parties and the difference between holding power or not. Writing them off as “the contented young” and waiting for them to come around, is hardly an option for either party.
However, his argument that young people are content and that’s why they don’t vote is erroneous. First, young people ARE voting. The 2006 election was the second in a row in which the youth vote went up, increasing by two million voters over the last midterm election, a 25% increase. That came on the heels of the 2004 election, when turnout among 18-29 year olds increased by 4.3 million, or nine percentage points, over 2000 levels. The very youngest voters, 18-24, increased their turnout by 11 percentage points, nearly three times the overall electorate’s turnout increase (4 points). Young voters drove the nation’s high turnout in 2004.
Second, Barone uses Social Security as an example of young people’s “whatever” attitude and contentedness with the status quo. But Social Security is just one issue that, at the time of the debate, did indeed engage young activists. And when polled, young adults indicate that their top concerns include a number of crucial issues through which both Republicans and Democrats can reach out to this cohort, including jobs and the economy, the cost of college, Iraq, and health care.
According to a Young Voter Battleground Poll conducted by the bipartisan polling team of Ed Goeas of the Tarrance Group and Celinda Lake of Lake Research Partners, a plurality of young voters (39%) cast ballots in order to support a candidate or political party with whom they agreed on the issues. Forty-three percent of those surveyed named the war in Iraq as the most important issue when deciding who to vote for in 2006, followed by health care (37%), creating jobs (36%), and college affordability (31%).
Where does this leave Republicans? Today’s young adults are leaning Democratic currently, but Republicans shouldn’t and can’t throw up their hands and walk away. (As many top Republicans have said themselves, including top strategist Karl Rove) This generation is too big to walk away from and research indicates that partisanship is formed in early adulthood and remains significantly stable throughout life. If Republicans want to win tight elections now and regain power in the future, they need to court young people.
Not only must Republicans court young voters, there is a strong constituency of Republican and Independent young adults eager for outreach from the GOP. In 2006, 38% of 18-29 year olds voted for Republican congressional candidates – given that this age group will number more than 42 million in 2008, that’s a big bloc of potential voters. Further, according to 2006 polling, young Republicans were ten percentage points more likely than young Democrats to say they were “almost certain” to vote this past election or has already voted early. They were also strongly supportive of President Bush (83% approval, compared to 38% overall) and of the Republican Party. Republicans must continue to engage and energize GOP voters under 30.
Today, young voters are of the size and increasing propensity to vote that they can make the difference in close elections; ten years from now, they will be the base for the political parties and the difference between holding power or not. Writing them off as “the contented young” and waiting for them to come around, is hardly an option for either party.
Labels: republican, youth vote
posted by Lindsey B. at 12:51 PM
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