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4 out of the top 5 are extremely liberal. In the top ten, let's calculate by population. Blue: 66.8M (5.7 + 7.6 + 39.5 + 4.2 + 6.8 + 3) Red: 12.3M (3.2 + 1.8

4 out of the top 5 are extremely liberal. In the top ten, let's calculate by population. Blue: 66.8M (5.7 + 7.6 + 39.5 + 4.2 + 6.8 + 3) Red: 12.3M (3.2 + 1.8 + 7.3) Swing (aka Florida): 21.5M This can be a bit confusing so let's skip straight to the point. If you take the house of representatives and add up GDP by district, democrats account for $10.2T and republicans account for $6.2T (1). The differences don't stop there. Republican districts have slower economic growth, less skilled labor, less educated workers, and a host of other bad indicators. (1) https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/15/charts-democrats-represent-modern-economy-republicans-left-behind.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/15/charts-democrats-represent-m...

hpkuarg 6y ago
Interesting discussion. Take some of the districts shown in your source: NY-10, a Democratic district, is like half of Manhattan plus bits of Brooklyn. PA-13, a Republican district, is 98% rural Pennsylvania with some small towns thrown in. Rural districts lean Republican, and urban districts lean Democratic. I'd wager that the bad indicators you mention are better explained by the rural/urban divide more so than political leanings. A central business district of a major city is going to have better economic growth, higher-skilled and more educated labor, and a host of other good indicators compared to farmland. I agree there is correlation between dense urban areas (which are more likely to lean Democratic) having a higher GDP output and rural areas (which are more likely to lean Republican) having a lower GDP output. However, you would need to provide stronger evidence that there is any causality established there. I'd say the causality runs the other way around: people in high density living situations (which for better or worse have been the primary driver of GDP growth since the industrial revolution) are amenable to more government regulation, simply by virtue of the problems caused by that same density -- people encounter "this is why we can't have nice things" kinds of situations, and want regulation to counter those, a lot more often when squeezed into big cities. Therefore those places lean Democratic in the US. The opposite applies for rural areas. I don't think you can claim that you could take a rural (and therefore Republican-leaning) area, turn the voters there Democratic, and cause economic growth to happen, without first turning it into a dense city.
- dumbfoundded 6y ago
  The causality is certainly confusing and not clear cut. It does seem that these small towns are in desperate need of liberal economic policies yet they vote the opposite. Rural areas need investment in education, infrastructure, and job retraining. If you turned Republican towns blue, you'd almost certainly help their cause.

hpkuarg 6y ago

Interesting discussion. Take some of the districts shown in your source: NY-10, a Democratic district, is like half of Manhattan plus bits of Brooklyn. PA-13, a Republican district, is 98% rural Pennsylvania with some small towns thrown in. Rural districts lean Republican, and urban districts lean Democratic. I'd wager that the bad indicators you mention are better explained by the rural/urban divide more so than political leanings. A central business district of a major city is going to have better economic growth, higher-skilled and more educated labor, and a host of other good indicators compared to farmland. I agree there is correlation between dense urban areas (which are more likely to lean Democratic) having a higher GDP output and rural areas (which are more likely to lean Republican) having a lower GDP output. However, you would need to provide stronger evidence that there is any causality established there. I'd say the causality runs the other way around: people in high density living situations (which for better or worse have been the primary driver of GDP growth since the industrial revolution) are amenable to more government regulation, simply by virtue of the problems caused by that same density -- people encounter "this is why we can't have nice things" kinds of situations, and want regulation to counter those, a lot more often when squeezed into big cities. Therefore those places lean Democratic in the US. The opposite applies for rural areas. I don't think you can claim that you could take a rural (and therefore Republican-leaning) area, turn the voters there Democratic, and cause economic growth to happen, without first turning it into a dense city.

dumbfoundded 6y ago
The causality is certainly confusing and not clear cut. It does seem that these small towns are in desperate need of liberal economic policies yet they vote the opposite. Rural areas need investment in education, infrastructure, and job retraining. If you turned Republican towns blue, you'd almost certainly help their cause.