Humdedum

Posted by Rick in Uncategorized (Thursday September 30, 2004 at 10:56 am)

If Democrats are for the poor and Republicans are for the rich, why does the entire South, along with other rural areas (where the a large portion of people live below the poverty line), vote overwhelmingly Republican while all the rich folk in big cities vote Democrat?

20 Responses to “Humdedum”

  1. Valerie (Kyriosity) Says:
    September 30th, 2004 at 12:11 pm

    Well…you know how ignorant po’ folk are…they just don’t know no better. So the rich have to set them straight and tell them what’s good for them.

  2. Jen Says:
    September 30th, 2004 at 4:27 pm

    Rick! You are using logc! Damn you!

  3. scott cunningham Says:
    October 4th, 2004 at 5:13 pm

    A high percentage of poor black southerners do vote Democrat.

  4. garver Says:
    October 4th, 2004 at 6:59 pm

    As do most of the poor folks in big cities. People in big cities generally vote Democrat, rich or poor. Well, except for the really rich. They vote Republican.

  5. Rick Says:
    October 5th, 2004 at 1:26 pm

    Well, I would of thought that would be the case, but it seems that with my students, all the poor black ones are voting for Bush. As are all my freshman. I’m only finding the Kerry fans in grad school, and they’re all white. (Oddly, all the black faculty and grad students vote Republican.)

  6. scott cunningham Says:
    October 5th, 2004 at 2:54 pm

    I don’t have the numbers, but I think the Democratic party carries the black vote in the South (including Louisiana) by a significant margin. That’s partly why there’s been some complaints among African-americans that Democrats take the black vote for granted.

  7. scott cunningham Says:
    October 5th, 2004 at 2:56 pm

    It may have to do with your sample, too. Still, it’s interesting that your student black students are pro-Bush. I get the sense my students all skew towards Democrat. Of course, Athens is incredibly liberal - a tiny San Francisco isle amidst a very conservative state.

  8. Rick Says:
    October 5th, 2004 at 6:59 pm

    Monroe is about 70% black, and it’s significantly Republican.

  9. scott cunningham Says:
    October 6th, 2004 at 7:18 pm

    The 2000 census shows Monroe, LA 33.6% black, and the almost 65% white. I can’t find data on votes.

  10. jon Says:
    October 6th, 2004 at 9:29 pm

    You must have the stats backwards, Scott. See the following page:

    http://www.epodunk.com/cgi-bin/popInfo.php?locIndex=3487

  11. jon Says:
    October 6th, 2004 at 9:39 pm

    Or maybe you confused the overall state’s figures with Monroe’s.

  12. scott cunningham Says:
    October 7th, 2004 at 6:23 am

    You can see the census data for 2000 here. Click on “datasets” on the left hand side, then “detailed tables” on the right hand side. Then build the statistics you want by selecting each county, MSA (metropolitan statistical area [ie, cities with more than 100,000 population], or whatever unit of observation you desire). Monroe had 147,250 in 2000. 94,947 were white; 49,526 were black.

    If you use the state of Louisiana as the unit of observation, the percentage of the total population that is black falls a little. The total number of residents of Louisiana in 2000 was 4,468,976. The total number of African-Americans was 1,451,944 (note this is listed as “Black or African-American Alone”. This does not include mixed races, but if mixed races was added, it does not appear to make a huge difference). That’s 32.5% - roughly a third of the state of Louisiana is black and roughly a third of Monroe is black.

  13. scott cunningham Says:
    October 7th, 2004 at 6:24 am

    Hmm. Not taking HTML. Here’s the link to the census data. It’s a handy website.

    http://factfinder.census.gov/home/saff/main.html?_lang=en

  14. scott cunningham Says:
    October 7th, 2004 at 6:39 am

    I don’t understand the discreprancy between the two sources, since the website you posted says it is using as its source the 2000 Census. It makes some qualifications of drawing population data from different tables within the census (the SF1 vs. the SF3), but when I look at both the SF1 and the SF3, I get the same population of 147,000 and the black population at a third of that. He may be using a different geographical drawing of the city of Monroe than the MSA (metropolitan statistical area), but I can’t find anything in the tables available online for anything other than MSA or Primary MSA. But, that may be what is causing the difference. MSA is a statistical measurement - it sometimes includes in it surrounding counties and groups them under the heading of a city. So, possibly, the 2000 Census MSA for Monroe includes several surrounding areas composed primarily of white individuals and that explains the difference. I wrote the link you posted, Jon, and so he’ll respond later with the reason for the discreprancy.

  15. scott cunningham Says:
    October 7th, 2004 at 6:43 am

    Actually, I think that is it. See this website:

    http://www.epodunk.com/cgi-bin/genInfo.php?locIndex=3519

    Ouachita Parish, LA has a population of 147,000 - same as the MSA stat above. So the 2000 census must be using Ouachita Parish as the unit of observation, rather than Monroe proper. Interesting - I didn’t realize there could be that kind of discreprancy when using MSA. THat’s definintely something for me to remember, since my dissertation has been using MSA population counts. Aggravating.

  16. scott cunningham Says:
    October 7th, 2004 at 6:45 am

    Yep - the MSA must include, not just Monroe, but West Monroe, Richwood and Sterlington. Weird, but even after adding those populations in, you do’nt get 147,000. You only get a bump of like 20,000.

  17. scott cunningham Says:
    October 7th, 2004 at 6:47 am

    Okay, I get it. The county is pretty big. I see a map here and it includes several other areas like Sterlington, Swartz, Claiborne, Richwood, and probably others not showing up. That’s the discreprancy.

  18. jon Says:
    October 7th, 2004 at 10:50 am

    You got it. And it’s parish, dude, not county. What are you, some kinda Protestant non-Louisianan? :)

  19. Rick Says:
    October 7th, 2004 at 11:22 am

    Thanks for explaining that Jon. I had forgotten what that “county” word meant ;-)

  20. Rick Says:
    October 7th, 2004 at 11:23 am

    Yeah, West Monroe is considerably white.

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