It’s pretty obvious from election maps and donor data that the democrats are now the party of coastal/urban elites, despite what they may advertise.
As a rough approximation, almost everyone in your social circles having a college degree.
An individual’s likelihood of being a Democrat decreases with every additional dollar he or she earns. Democrats have a huge advantage (63 percent) with voters earning less than $15,000 per year. This advantage carries forward for individuals earning up to $50,000 per year, and then turns in the Republicans’ favor — with just 36 percent of individuals earning more than $200,000 per year supporting Democrats.
https://www.debt.org/faqs/americans-in-debt/economic-demogra...
A large slice of voters self identify as independent, but their voting habits don’t match that self identification. It’s that classic independent streak myth so popular among Americans.
"In the 2016 election, a wide gap in presidential preferences emerged between those with and without a college degree. College graduates backed Clinton by a 9-point margin (52%-43%), while those without a college degree backed Trump 52%-44%. This is by far the widest gap in support among college graduates and non-college graduates in exit polls dating back to 1980."
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/11/09/behind-trum...
https://www.nytimes.com/elections/2012/results/president/exi...
No college degree Obama: 51%
Some college Obama: 49%.
College Romney: 51%
Postgrad. Obama: 55%
PS: Split tickets in 2020 are another indicator of more topical voting behavior.
What's the plan to get there?
It's one thing if you have a college degree and half of your acquaintances don't. It's another if you rarely have meaningful interactions with anyone who doesn't; in that case you're in a subculture that has very different experiences than the average American.
Urban populations, sure. Not particularly coastal aside from the fact that there's more urban population on the coasts, as county-level maps show pretty clearly.
“Elites” are more dubious. Sure, Democrats and Republicans (counting leaners) are closer to parity for voters with less than a college degree, with college grads and even moreso postgraduate degree holders strongly favoring Democrats.
OTOH, Blacks, who are overwhelming not elites, overwhelming are (and even more overwhelming lean) Democratic, and the same is true predominantly (though less overwhelmingly) of Hispanics.
So, yes, to the urban part, not particularly independently true of the “elite” or “coastal” part.
Urban mostly means "denser than suburban tracts of single-family homes".
By the census definitions, which don't separate out suburban as a separate category, but encompass what would normally be thought of that way as part of urban. If you look at the urban core counties in the Pew list below and a by-county election map of the US, there's a pretty close correlation, visually at least.
https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2020/07/29/prior-to-covid-19...
I think that's actually the rub. Blacks and Hispanics are voting less and less for Democrats, and that is true more for this last election than 2016 [1]
Despite the very visible rhetoric of racial equality and other movements, the Dems are becoming the party of rich white people.
[1] - https://news.yahoo.com/exit-poll-black-men-drifted-204522278...
Clinton won greater than 90% of the black vote in 2016, as did House Democrats in 2018; there's indications that Biden did a little worse this year. specifically among black men.
> the Dems are becoming the party of rich white people.
Good verified voter data for 2020 will take a while, but in 2016 Trump won 55-39 among whites with over $150K income; the Republicans (while they have support elsewhere, as well) are very much the party of rich white people. Meanwhile, even if they've lost some ground with some of these groups compared to some point in the past, Democrats remain heavily favored, nationally, by blacks, asians, and hispanics.
Agreed and my above source is (probably) using exit poll data, which we should be a bit suspicious about. This is early and it's going to take a few weeks to get and unpack data.
> in 2016 Trump won 55-39 among whites with over $150K income;
And he seems to have taken losses there in 2020
> even if they've lost some ground with some of these groups compared to some point in the past, Democrats remain heavily favored, nationally, by blacks, asians, and hispanics.
I was reading an analysis today that suggested Dems may continue to lose these groups - and they will be losing them to the Republicans ( [2] but note the source and that's it opinion and give the appropriate grain of salt). Given how uncomfortably close 2020 has been for the Dems, I would not rest on my laurels and assume we'll just continue to come out ahead in these groups.
It's starting to seem like there is something the Republicans are selling that are picking up these groups, and the Dems are failing to hold onto them despite their messaging.
[2] - https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/what-if-americas-...
Normally, exit polling aren't too problematic, but exit polls in this election when "vote in person" vs. "vote by mail" has been a matter itself of intense partisan division, well... There's a fairly obvious built-in bias compared to the electorate at large.
> I was reading an analysis today that suggested Dems may continue to lose these groups - and they will be losing them to the Republicans ( [2] but note the source and that's it opinion and give the appropriate grain of salt). Given how uncomfortably close 2020 has been for the Dems, I would not rest on my laurels and assume we'll just continue to come out ahead in these groups.
I'm not sure there is a grain of salt large enough for "analysis" from the Editor-in-Chief of the Washington Examiner which rests on no apparent actual data. That said, I think complacency is never good, and I think the Democratic Party should be active asking how it can serve all kind of communities better, including black, hispanic, and other racial/ethnic minorities (and the working class generally, and...)
But there's a difference between that and believing that there is clear (or even strongly suggestive) evidence of a particular problem with certain particular communities (I think there is, but more with the working class than race/ethnic minorities, right now; but I think that means we need greater additional effort in the "working class" area, not an absence of it in the others.)
Firstly "Hispanics" is way too diverse a demographic to ever vote as a block. Cuban Hispanics in Miami vote very differently to people of Mexican extraction in California. That in itself will cause some variation election-to-election.
Secondly, and specific to this election: Republicans were very effective in their door-to-door registration and get-out-the-vote campaigns in "new voter" Hispanic communities in Florida and Texas. The Democratic party avoided this because of COVID-19 and it cost them badly.
It seems to me the pattern is that where population density increases the people tend to be more politically leftward-leaning.
https://twitter.com/gelliottmorris/status/132625098113116979...
I'm from flyover country, one of those three states that went Biden this year surrounded by a sea of red. You know, one of the three states that elected half the members of 'the squad'. Sure, California rich people can throw in a lot of money, but that's true for both Republican and Democratic parties. Don't dismiss our importance in the Democratic party. We turn up & do the work, including the work of talking with our 'red' neighbors and actually trying to work things out in this country.
As for high & low vs middle, it just doesn't make sense to me. Lots of rich people supporting the Republicans -- lots, lots, lots. Lots of rich people supporting the Dems. Poor people split by race and geography. Middle class people split by race and geography. The split by geography and race is more significant than the split by income, in almost every presentation of data that I see.