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Comment by orwin | Hacker News Reader

Shouldn't the median republican voter have an higher income (and way higher capital) than the median democrat voter?

I agree that if you go only at the top decile, the median democrat voter could make a bit more than the median republican voter (idk really), but if you take the whole population? I remember 2016 Sanders campaign funding.

Also, i went to West Virginia, an know the people there, happen to meet the local democrat (pro blue water, proponent of the redneck movement, basically a communist compared to the average american) and saw his electorate. I mean, they do live the good life, they eat venison and a lot of homegrown vegetables, they ride horses and sell lilies (no joke), brew their (mostly) bad beer and throw day-long parties on sunday where you jam from one PM to eleven (i improved more in two weeks there than in the last five year). But their income? i'd be surprised if they aren't in the last decile (or almost there).

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> Shouldn't the median republican voter have an higher income (and way higher capital) than the median democrat voter?

It's not really this simple anymore.

Americans are sorting into the party of college grads (Democrats) and the party of non-college-grads (Republicans). This doesn't translate as neatly to income as you might think, but it's definitely a factor.

> they eat venison and a lot of homegrown vegetables, they ride horses and sell lilies (no joke), brew their (mostly) bad beer and throw day-long parties on sunday

This is not typical of any large group of voters, including in West Virginia. As someone who grew up there, I can tell you that most people buy food from Walmart. They don't grow it. There is certainly eating of venison, but frozen pizza is certainly more popular. Horses (and the riding of them) is uncommon.

Despite being oft-repeated, that educational claim isn't really true.

In 2016, Trump beat Hillary in white college-educated women, despite all the claims about gender and education popular in certain sections of media.

I think one big problem with discussion about American politics today is that we all pretend like "Republican" and "Democrat" are in any way logically consistent groups representing two opinions. The truth is, they're both completely absurd coalitions of diverse groups, bound up out of necessity by America having a two-party system.

Instead of trying to split people into two groups along whatever line - education, income, urbanization, race, religion, we should just accept that the parties are a hodgepodge of many different groups. For instance, the Democrats have as a coalition both Black voters and LGBT voters, despite the fact that Black Americans have been far less progressive on LGBT issues than White Americans. Republicans have as a coalition both "small government" fiscal conservatives and Christian social conservatives, despite these groups often having polar opposite policy goals.

> Despite being oft-repeated, that educational claim isn't really true.

I agree with this, it’s been my experience that most of the most intelligent and highly educated people I know are solidly GOP…except those who work in higher education. Although…some of them in higher education I know vote GOP, but claim they don’t, or don’t disclose it publicly.

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