The exit polls show us how many different factors affected voting behavior in the 2008 election. I chose to look at the differences from 2004 and 2008 among party identification, gender/sex, education/income, and religion. Party identification held constant for the most part, but in the remaining factors, Democrats made big gains as the Republicans lost ground and proved Herrington and Keefe's statements wrong for this past election.
Our book suggests that there are a few factors that influence in how people will vote. The first, and most important, is your party identification. Do you consider yourself a Democrat or a Republican? Depending on how you answer is going to mean which way you will vote as well. Other factors include, gender, sex, party politics, religion, education, and income. Every individual is affected by these factors and therefore influences his/her vote, not every factor affects each individual the same or to the same degree as the next person.
1. Most important political opinion is your Party Identification
- Exit polls suggest that this was true for the most part in the last election where 90% of the electorate who considered themselves Democrats voted for Obama while the other 10% voted for McCain. McCain also receive 90% of the votes from those who considered themselves to be Republican.
- Our readings have suggested that people do not generally switch their party identification all that much, meaning one day they do not consider themselves to be a Democrat and the next day consider themselves to be a Republican. Changes, if they do occur at all in a lifetime, generally take many years. Our book also suggests that Republicans are more likely than Democrats to stick with their party loyalty and identification, as well as show up to vote more so than Democrats that is why this poll is interesting to me for a few reasons. First of all, from the 2004 election to the 2008 election, 89% of Democrats who voted for Kerry also voted for Obama to Bush/McCain 82%, showing that Democrats stuck to party lines more so than Republicans did. Also, 71% of those who voted for Obama did not vote in the past election came to cast ballots in 2008, proving both of those statements Herrington and Keefe told us to be false in this last election.
Vote for President in 2004
Total Obama McCain Other/No Answer
| Kerry (37%) | 89% | 9% | 2% | | |
| Bush (46%) | 17% | 82% | 1% | | |
| Someone Else (4%) | 66% | 24% | 10% | | |
| Did Not Vote (13%) | 71% | 27% | 2% | |
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2. Gender and Sex
- Women are more liberal/vote Democratic and Men are more Conservative/tend to vote more Republican (H and K, 194). In the recent election, Obama surprisingly won more of the percentage of both women and men than McCain did. With that being said, McCain won the “white” vote whereas Obama won majority of his votes from minorities. The only area where Obama did not lose whites was among the White 18-29 age group.
3. Religion
- Those who attend church regularly are more Republican by todays data (H and K, 194). The trend held true for this last elections. Those who attended church weekly or more than weekly cast more of their votes for McCain than those who attended monthly or less. Herington and Keefe made the point that Republicans hold core traditional family and religious values, which impacts their political opinions (H and K, 195).
- In recent elections of 2000 and 2004, Catholics voted more Republican than Democratic, but the exit polls from CNN suggest that Protestants casted the most votes for McCain while Catholics, Jews, and Other denominations casted more of their votes for Obama.
4. Education and Income
- Those with higher educations tend to vote more than those who don’t and those with higher educations generally have higher incomes and tend to vote Republican (H and K, 192). This next table is also interesting to me, whites who earned more than $50,000 voted McCain while Non-whites who earned more than $50,000 voted for Obama. While Herrington and Keefe generally said, those with higher incomes tend to vote Republican, this table suggests it does not hold true all of the time. My reasoning behind this is that the 2008 election was a stepping stone for minorities to gain a true voice in government by electing the first black president, and when you have African American supporters like Beyonce, Oprah and Young Jeezy supporting you so do the other rich minorities. That may have made the difference in this election compared to what Herrington and Keefe said about income and party identification.
Vote by Income and Race
Total Obama McCain Other/No Answer
| Whites Under $50,000 (25%) | 47% | 51% | 2% | | |
| Whites Over $50,000 (49%) | 43% | 56% | 1% | | |
| Non-Whites Under $50,000 (13%) | 86% | 13% | 1% | | |
| Non-Whites Over $50,000 (13%) | 75% | 22% | 3% | | |
Hey Nina,
ReplyDeleteI really find this "gapology" to be quite interesting. I think I always knew, but didn't quite understand how many different ways we can analyze a presidential vote. CNN has educated me in this area...
In regards to the religion gap which you undertake in your post. I figured that real differences would be found in voting behavior among all the different religious denominations. I was wrong. I found it intriguing that the differences come in more on the grounds of religious committment, meaning how often a voter attends church. But when thinking about it critically it makes sense. As you suggested about Hetherington and Keefe's book, they mention that their more core traditional values will have an impact on their voting behavior.
Good job!
Good post. Since you very aptly point out that Party ID is the biggest determinant, why do we see such radical changes in election outcomes? In other words, why is Party ID fluctuating from year to year?
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