Volume 3: Votes, giving and places
Part VIII
Places and the people in them
Education, income, ethnicity and rurality each relate to the county vote differently from what the raw correlation suggests, and within a party, where someone lives says far less about their views than which party they belong to.
The composition of a county does not identify how its residents vote, and the part ends by returning from places to survey respondents. Chapter 8.1, Five axes of the county vote compares county characteristics jointly, because they overlap, and distinguishes an association from the variance a model reproduces. Education, income, ethnicity and rurality each relate to the county vote differently from what the raw correlation suggests. Chapter 8.2, Education, ethnicity and the county shift, 2016 to 2024 moves from vote levels to vote changes and distinguishes the composition of a county's residents from how members of a group voted. Chapter 8.3, Party and place closes the empirical sequence with respondent-level opinion. Within a party, where someone lives says far less about their views than which party they belong to. Companion 8.1a, The diploma map, Companion 8.1b, Wages, capital and the ZIP code vote, Companion 8.1c, Measures of hardship compared and Companion 8.1d, Air pollution and the vote are companions to the five-axes chapter, and each tests an alternative comparison. Composition and behavior in county change, and immigration attitudes and the local context, are on the research agenda.
Explorer for this part: Neighborhoods. The 2020 vote by ZIP code, tract and block group.
Chapters
- 8.1
Five axes of the county vote
In 2024, college share had the largest correlation with the county two-party margin among five county characteristics, +0.66 vote-weighted, and it is not separated from rural share's −0.65.
DraftPlacescounty-returnscounty-demographics
- 8.1aCompanion
The diploma map
Counting counties by their votes, a county with 10 more points of college share had a Democratic share of the two-party presidential vote 9.2 points higher in 2024, against 3.9 points in 2000.
DraftPlacescounty-returnscounty-demographics
- 8.1bCompanion
Wages, capital and the ZIP code vote
From 2016 to 2020, ZIP codes in the highest decile of capital-gains returns swung 5.4 points toward the Democrats and those in the highest decile of earned income tax credit returns 5.2 points toward the Republicans, links that depend on the controls.
DraftPlacesrlcrirs-soi
- 8.1cCompanion
Measures of hardship compared
Across 80,873 census tracts, the median absolute coefficient of a hardship measure on the 2020 Democratic vote falls from 4.7 points per standard deviation to 2.2 once race and ethnicity, education, density and state are held fixed.
DraftPlacesrlcradiopportunity-atlasejscreencdc-placessocial-capital-atlasirs-soi
- 8.1dCompanion
Air pollution and the vote
Tracts with more diesel exposure voted more Democratic in 2020, by 24.8 points per standard deviation of exposure, but only 4.9 points once race, income, education and density are held fixed.
DraftPlacesrlcrejscreen
- 8.2
Education, ethnicity and the county shift, 2016 to 2024
In 2020 to 2024, counties with more Hispanic residents moved further toward the Republicans than other counties did, a vote-weighted correlation of −0.66 with the swing, against +0.45 in 2012 to 2016.
DraftPlacescounty-returnscounty-demographicsces
- 8.3
Party and place
Across 12 policy issues in 2013 to 2021, Democrats and Republicans in the same kind of county differ by 43.1 points, and one party's members in deep-blue and deep-red counties differ by 5.6 points.
DraftIndividualscescounty-returnsanes
14 further questions for this part are on the research agenda.