2008 The Youth Vote
posted by on November 5 at 12:51 PM
Remember all the debates over whether young people would actually turn out for Obama? In addition to videos like this and photos like the ones below, we now have some preliminary statistical answers:
Young voters diverged sharply from the population as a whole, preferring Obama/Biden over McCain/Palin by 66% to 32% in the NEP. This is by far the highest share of the youth vote obtained by any candidate since exit polls began reporting results by age categories in 1976.
But that’s just percentages of a whole. What is the whole itself? What are we talking about in terms of the actual number of young voters who turned out? Some more numbers, again preliminary:
An estimated 21.6 million-23.9 million young Americans voted in Tuesday’s presidential election, an increase of at least 2.2 million compared with 2004, according to national exit polls, demographic data, and projections of total numbers of votes cast.
I thought it would be a larger gain then that.... :(
but yay! youth vote.
But are there more or less young people than there were then?
The key difference was that white voters went for the Dem more than ever. And so did Hispanics. And so did African Americans.
In fact, it was an American victory - by Americans.
Congrats to the first US President from Hawaii!
Most of the breakdowns by age I have seen put 18-29 in one bin. I love how nowdays one gets to be a "youth" up until an age that one's parents would have finished college, got married, had their first child, and bought their first house.
I'd also be interested to see the change in voter turnout among actual youths, i.e. people aged 18-21.
Actually, it turns out they didn't turn out that much after all. 18-29 year olds made up 18% of all voters, as compared with 17% in 2004.
Also, the idea that people used to get married earlier is true of our parents, but not of our grandparents. Getting married early was uniquely a 50s-60s phenomenon in the US.
@5: Not in the South, it wasn't.
That does it!!! NEVER again will I believe the perennial hype and anecdotal evidence from every election cycle that the the youth vote will come out like never before and be a tidal wave to be reckoned with. If they couldn't make it for THIS, of all elections, they will never come out in more than the pathetic dribble that they did in this one. Hey, I have a great idea!!! Let's pass a constitutional amendment to raise the voting age to 30!!! That will set their pants on fire...
Innumeracy sucks. The question is not the numbers of young voters who showed up or the percent of the total population that young voters comprise, but the proportions of young people who are registered to vote and then the proportion of those who actually vote.
Compare these numbers to the same in other election cycles and you'll have your answer.