I was just talking about this issue last night with a couple friends. One is a teacher, and she said that every morning for the last week or so, she's been gett

I was just talking about this issue last night with a couple friends. One is a teacher, and she said that every morning for the last week or so, she's been getting a list from the teachers' union of the candidates she should vote for. The other friend works for a non-profit, and she says that it's repeated to them in no uncertain terms that if they want to keep their jobs, they better vote a certain way; after all, their funding depends on it. So while your post makes a lot of sense on an individual basis, it seems that self-interested groups are almost certainly a factor in the way people vote. It would be pretty easy to miss this looking at things like income or age; I'd be more interested in seeing studies based on union affiliation or some other sentient grouping (as opposed to a non-sentient group like "people over 60").