Who Votes Now?

Demographics, Issues, Inequality, and Turnout in the United States

Jan E. Leighley, Jonathan Nagler

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780691159355, 9780691159348
• eBook ISBN: 9781400848621
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: American Government
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Who Votes Now? compares the demographic characteristics and political views of voters and nonvoters in American presidential elections since 1972 and examines how electoral reforms and the choices offered by candidates influence voter turnout. Drawing on a wealth of data from the U.S. Census Bureau's Current Population Survey and the American National Election Studies, Jan Leighley and Jonathan Nagler demonstrate that the rich have consistently voted more than the poor for the past four decades, and that voters are substantially more conservative in their economic views than nonvoters. They find that women are now more likely to vote than men, that the gap in voting rates between blacks and whites has largely disappeared, and that older Americans continue to vote more than younger Americans. Leighley and Nagler also show how electoral reforms such as Election Day voter registration and absentee voting have boosted voter turnout, and how turnout would also rise if parties offered more distinct choices.


Providing the most systematic analysis available of modern voter turnout, Who Votes Now? reveals that persistent class bias in turnout has enduring political consequences, and that it really does matter who votes and who doesn't.

Index

abortion, 160, 161, 161n5, 172

Abrajano, Marisa, 69

absentee voting, 10, 76, 90, 93–94, 95, 119–20; effect of on voter turnout, 96–97, 107, 107nn11–12, 109, 111–12, 115, 117

Adams, James, 123, 124

African Americans, 26, 80; bivariate evidence that African Americans are less likely to vote than whites, 68, 68n19; changes in voter turnout for, 53–54; gap in voter turnout between whites and African Americans, 68, 68nn19–20, 70–71, 70n25; higher levels of education and income among, 53; increase in the population of, 17; increase in voter turnout of, 31

age, as a factor in voter turnout, 27, 29, 52, 72–73, 76, 76n28, 105n9; conditional effect of on voter turnout, 54, 57, 70, 72; and the life-cycle model of age effects, 72–73; net group effect of EDR across age groups in Wave 1, Wave 2, and Wave 3 states, 105, 107, 107n10. See also demographics, of voter turnout

Aldrich, John H., 55, 122–23

alienation, 9, 123–24; measurement of, 147–51, 153; multivariate analysis of perceived policy alienation and policy difference, 128–31, 133–35; perceived policy alienation, 125, 125n5; perceived policy alienation and difference across income groups, 135, 137–39; policy-based concepts of indifference and alienation, 125

Alvarez, Michael, 69

American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), 73, 76

American National Election Studies (NES), 12, 14, 19, 22, 58, 147, 151, 156, 158, 161, 167; NES-validated vote measures, 20, 20n12; question wording of survey items, 177–79

American Voter, The (Campbell, Converse, Miller, and Stokes), 16

Anglos (non-Hispanic whites), 13, 13n16, 26; decline in the population of, 17; differences in voter turnout compared to that of African Americans, 68, 68nn19–20, 70–71, 70n25; voter turnout among, 31, 38, 69, 81

Ashenfelter, Orley, 123

at-risk effects. See election day registration (EDR): at-risk effects of on voter population

Bartels, Larry, 157

Beck, Paul Allen, 73

Bennett, Stephen Earl, 156

Berelson, Bernard, 16

Biden, Joe, 4

Brady, Henry E., 187

Brians, Craig Leonard, 96

Brox, Brian J., 97

Burris, Arthur L., 69, 69n24

Bush, George W., 169

Campbell, Angus, 16

causality, establishment o...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• One: Introduction
• Two: Demographics of Turnout
• Three: Theoretical Framework and Models
• Four: The Legal Context of Turnout
• Five: Policy Choices and Turnout
• Six: On the Representativeness of Voters
• Seven: Conclusion
• References
• Index