Why do more educated people tend toward centrism?
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  Why do more educated people tend toward centrism?
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Greater ability for abstract thinking
 
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Greater knowledge of the facts of the world
 
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Author Topic: Why do more educated people tend toward centrism?  (Read 3057 times)
This is Eharding, guys
ossoff2028
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« on: July 12, 2017, 05:35:44 PM »

It is a well-known truism that places with a high concentration of well-educated people (e.g., GA-06, Manhattan, NoVa, Cambridge) tended to reject extreme right demagogues like Cruz and populist center-right politicians like Trump in favor of candidates more congenial to (though still very much incompatible with) the Democratic base like Rubio and Kasich. Likewise, places with a high concentration of well-educated people tended to be somewhat more pro-Hillary in the 2016 Democratic primary and much more pro-Obama in the 2008 Democratic primary than those with similar racial demographics. The question remains, why is this so? Why would better-educated people tend toward not the far left or far right, but the center? If you think the options listed by me are insufficient, please describe your hypothesis below.
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #1 on: July 12, 2017, 05:46:09 PM »

Because "educated" people are usually rich, and rich people like to keep things the way they are.
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OSR stands with Israel
Computer89
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« Reply #2 on: July 12, 2017, 06:00:16 PM »

Cause they know the far right and far left has been a major failure everywhere its been tried.
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This is Eharding, guys
ossoff2028
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« Reply #3 on: July 12, 2017, 06:01:18 PM »

Because "educated" people are usually rich, and rich people like to keep things the way they are.
Am doubtful. Look at Livingston County, MI, Litchfield County, CT, Suffolk County, NY, Staten Island, St. Charles' County, MO (rich counties that had a higher percentage go for Trump than Romney). See the FiveThirtyEight article on this.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/education-not-income-predicted-who-would-vote-for-trump/
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Sprouts Farmers Market ✘
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« Reply #4 on: July 12, 2017, 06:44:32 PM »

Because "educated" people are usually rich, and rich people like to keep things the way they are.
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Shameless Lefty Hack
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« Reply #5 on: July 12, 2017, 06:45:45 PM »

Because "educated" people are usually rich, and rich people like to keep things the way they are.

Also 1.
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Goldwater
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« Reply #6 on: July 12, 2017, 06:55:16 PM »

Excluding the conspiracy theory answer, none of the options imply a specific political view and aren't necessarily descriptive of educated people.
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Kingpoleon
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« Reply #7 on: July 12, 2017, 07:20:31 PM »

Because "educated" people are usually rich, and rich people like to keep things the way they are.
Ah, yes, it's the centrists who like to "keep things the way they are," with two increasingly extreme political parties that primary and attack moderates in their parties.
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Lechasseur
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« Reply #8 on: July 12, 2017, 08:47:21 PM »

Because "educated" people are usually rich, and rich people like to keep things the way they are.

Also 1.

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Unconditional Surrender Truman
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« Reply #9 on: July 12, 2017, 09:12:28 PM »

Because "educated" people are usually rich, and rich people like to keep things the way they are.
This. It's not so much that these people are "centrists" as it is that they support the status quo.
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TJ in Oregon
TJ in Cleve
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« Reply #10 on: July 12, 2017, 09:15:54 PM »

They don't. Under certain circumstances they will vote for more "centrist" candidates (accepting the conventional media definition for a moment), but it's by no means a guiding rule. Simply look at the results from college towns in the 2016 Democratic presidential primary.
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This is Eharding, guys
ossoff2028
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« Reply #11 on: July 12, 2017, 10:13:54 PM »

They don't. Under certain circumstances they will vote for more "centrist" candidates (accepting the conventional media definition for a moment), but it's by no means a guiding rule. Simply look at the results from college towns in the 2016 Democratic presidential primary.
That is purely an age issue. In any case, results from college towns in the 2016 Democratic presidential primary appear to be correlated with the average income of the parents of those college towns' students. For example, Ypsilanti (Eastern Michigan University) went 66.8% for Sanders, Amherst (UMass Amherst) 66.3%, Ann Arbor (U of M Ann Arbor) 56%, Hanover (Dartmouth) 53%, and Cambridge (Harvard) 46.2%.
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Mr. Smith
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« Reply #12 on: July 12, 2017, 11:47:33 PM »

Greater opportunistic and over-ambitious drive, ideological pursuits tend to hamper such things.
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Sumner 1868
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« Reply #13 on: July 12, 2017, 11:53:37 PM »

Low energy.
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President Johnson
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« Reply #14 on: July 14, 2017, 04:23:08 AM »

Because it's probably easier to understand both sides. Ideology is often a bad thing, because it saves from own thought. Ideologies are often a pure vision that is unlikely or even impossible to accomplish or to fully function. Often, pragmatic thinking leads to the most success and is within the possible. To explain it in brief on the economy for example, the best solutions are mostly in the middle: You need some common-sense regulations, you need to make sure that everyone is paying their fair share, but you also can't tax and regulate the hell out of everything. Economic growth is necessary to expand wealth to everyone, and therefore you need a business-friendly environment. However, a completely unregulated market doesn't work and only helps the upper class and the rich. The government needs to make sure that everybody is playing by the same rules, and there also needs to be safety net for everyone who needs help. On the other hand, only those who really need it should benefit from a welfare state.
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« Reply #15 on: July 14, 2017, 05:46:21 AM »
« Edited: July 14, 2017, 07:16:51 AM by Çråbçæk »

Reminder again that one of the most loyal demographics in the rise of Hitler and the like were doctors, engineers, scientists, civil servants, businessmen etc.

The answer in short is that in America, Britain and most of the developed world the educated middle class are relatively content with their lives and see no reason to mess with a status quo that benefits them. In countries where the educated middle class are discontented (I.e. The middle class in Brazil, who feel that populism and corruption is having a detrimental effect on their quality of living) they are just as likely to fly into ideological extremes. Likewise certain elements of the educated classes are often very contemptuous of the status quo in developed countries - teachers, academics, doctors (who hilariously are stridently left in my country and stridently right in yours) and often swing in very ideological directions due to government policy.

And the relatively uneducated often are in the centre. Even in the context of modern America, you see large blocs like rural African Americans who are very loyal to the Clinton/Obama wing. That again is a calculation on their part - they feel that the perceived risk of a left swing would be more of a risk than a benefit, and so don't rock the boat. In fact the very uneducated are often a key part of large ideology-free centrist machines like Tammany Hall or the old German Centre Party.

And finally of course, one should be precise in our definitions if we are to make useful conclusions, and definitely avoid cross-contamination with other definitions.
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parochial boy
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« Reply #16 on: July 14, 2017, 07:04:22 AM »

Because it's probably easier to understand both sides. Ideology is often a bad thing, because it saves from own thought. Ideologies are often a pure vision that is unlikely or even impossible to accomplish or to fully function. Often, pragmatic thinking leads to the most success and is within the possible. To explain it in brief on the economy for example, the best solutions are mostly in the middle: You need some common-sense regulations, you need to make sure that everyone is paying their fair share, but you also can't tax and regulate the hell out of everything. Economic growth is necessary to expand wealth to everyone, and therefore you need a business-friendly environment. However, a completely unregulated market doesn't work and only helps the upper class and the rich. The government needs to make sure that everybody is playing by the same rules, and there also needs to be safety net for everyone who needs help. On the other hand, only those who really need it should benefit from a welfare state.

You realise that you have just listed a load of ideological positions, right?

Just because something is "moderate" doesn't mean it is not ideological.
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Leftbehind
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« Reply #17 on: July 14, 2017, 07:21:55 AM »
« Edited: July 14, 2017, 07:25:26 AM by ⚑ Comrade Corbyn for PM ⚑ »

Because "educated" people are usually rich, and rich people like to keep things the way they are.

Pretty much - comfortable living breeds those comfortable with the status quo.

I realise belatedly every f**ker has said this. Smiley
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Filuwaúrdjan
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« Reply #18 on: July 14, 2017, 09:49:12 AM »

Centrism isn't really a thing. The political centre depends entirely on context and, as it happens, in most contexts is vast enough to include a lot of perspectives with absolutely nothing in common with each other.
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Person Man
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« Reply #19 on: July 14, 2017, 10:06:09 AM »

They understand that too many people depend on the status quo yet the status quo must change as different people come in and need to be included into society.
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RFayette
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« Reply #20 on: July 14, 2017, 11:00:18 AM »

As TJ and others pointed out, voting for the more centrist candidate does not necessarily equal being more centrist.  African American Democrats are consistently more pro-redistribution in polling data than white Democrats but were far less likely to support Sanders, the more economically leftist candidate.   This is becausee people don't vote solely on issues - they also vote based on personalities and their sense of identity - for many cosmopolitan liberals, supporting people like Obama and Hillary was simply what they are accustomed to, because they see the Democratic Party establishment as friendly to them.
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mvd10
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« Reply #21 on: July 14, 2017, 03:48:04 PM »

SmileySmileySmileySmiley open tolerant SmileySmileySmileySmiley highly educated identity politics gave us Macron. Thank you!

Anyway, I actually think identity politics is part of the reason people like Macron do so well with more educated people (like RFayette said). Macron barely talked about policy in his speeches.
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IceAgeComing
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« Reply #22 on: July 14, 2017, 04:06:22 PM »

This isn't the case, in my experience at least.  I always found that in Labour leadership debates it was always the more educated people who supported Corbyn over the moderates; although that's all anecdotal.

According to the yougov post-election poll (wouldn't normally cite this because yougov cross-tabs are usually useless - but this has a 60,000 sample and its the easiest to find) graduates broke very heavily for Labour (49% Labour, 32% Tory, 11% Liberal) who were seen as being further from the centre than the Tories were - although probably not on many of the issues that that group might care about more than most (thinking of Europe, migration, the sort of socially liberal things like that) which the Tory campaign were pretty far to the right on.  The Liberals did better amongst this group - although not particularly well though; 11% is still worse than every election since 1970, bar 2015.
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Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself
omegascarlet
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« Reply #23 on: July 14, 2017, 07:00:22 PM »

Sources?
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buritobr
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« Reply #24 on: July 14, 2017, 07:06:17 PM »

This is no universal rule.

In Brazil, Bolsonaro (far-right) and PSOL (far-left) have more support of more educated people
PT had the support of more educated people when it was considered a far-left party. When PT became a center-left party, it received the support of poorer people.
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