The Millennials: Moving The Country Leftward
The New America Foundation is releasing a study tomorrow asserting that under-30 voters -- known as the Millennial generation -- will impart lasting progressive change on American politics.
The report indicates that the cohort skews more liberal on economic and social issues. Barack Obama was no doubt a draw during the 2008 presidential contest -- he and Joe Biden won 66 percent of the under 30 vote nationally -- but these younger voters also self-identify as liberals over conservatives in greater numbers than the broader voting population. Meanwhile, 45 percent of young voters said they were members of the Democratic Party, compared with 39 percent of all voters. All this means that the group's overwhelming support for the Democratic ticket during the 2008 presidential contest isn't simply a flash-in-the-pan phenomenon, experts say.
"Consistently they look not only more liberal than people today but also more liberal than other people were when they were young," said study co-author Peter Levine, director of research and director of the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning & Engagement at Tufts University.
The study indicates several areas in which the Millennials are more progressive at their age than older generations, including Gen Xers, Boomers and the Greatest Generation.
They see themselves as more liberal:
They believe in fewer numbers than their older counterparts that government is wasting money:
They are more supportive of unions:
And more of them support government-provided universal health insurance:
It is difficult to gauge the origin of Millennials' political liberalism though Levine cites one possibility: President Bush.
"One theory is it could be George W. Bush in an ironic way," he said, citing other surveys weighing voter satisfaction levels with the president. "He's extremely unpopular among young people, to some extent it's an anti-Bush reaction."
More broadly, though, younger voters are more idealistic, Levine said, and seem to have a different outlook on the world that is more reflective of their diversity and accepting of differences. They are already are showing their independence from older voters. According to the study, prior to 2004, only in 1980 and 1996 were young voters less likely than their elders to vote for the Republican candidate. In the last two presidential cycles, a generational gap in partisan preferences has emerged, opening in 2004 and widening in 2008. There was a 15-point difference between youth support for Obama/Biden in November and the Democratic Party's share of the entire popular vote.
All of this adds up, Levine said, to a durable move to the left for this up-and-coming generation of voters.
"Nobody has a crystal ball, but I think we've assembled some evidence that it matters where you start, and this group is starting more to the left than even the 1960s group," he said.
(JENNIFER SKALKA)
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