As the Democratic Party rebuilds itself for the 2018 and 2020 elections, Democratic strategists have been preoccupied with a pressing question: Why did so many voters who backed Barack Obama in 2012 switch to Donald Trump four years later, and what can be done to win them back? Top Democratic […] Read more »
We Asked People What They Know About Taxes. See If You Know The Answers
Back in 2012, Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s campaign suffered a blow when a tape was leaked of him grousing that 47 percent of Americans don’t pay federal income tax. It was one of the biggest gaffes of the presidential campaign, but a new poll conducted by Ipsos for NPR […] Read more »
Top Frustrations With Tax System: Sense That Corporations, Wealthy Don’t Pay Fair Share
A majority of Americans now view the federal tax system as unfair, including similar shares of Republicans and Democrats. But partisans differ in their concerns about the tax system, with Democrats far more likely than Republicans to express frustration that some corporations and wealthy people don’t pay their “fair share.” […] Read more »
The blogs vs. Case-Deaton
Anne Case and Angus Deaton have a new paper on white mortality rates. This one is getting attacked a lot more than the 2015 one, though the findings and methods are basically the same — increased death rates for U.S. whites, especially for the uneducated. Andrew Gelman is still on […] Read more »
Mortality and morbidity in the 21st century
In “Mortality and morbidity in the 21st century,” Princeton Professors Anne Case and Angus Deaton follow up on their groundbreaking 2015 paper that revealed a shocking increase in midlife mortality among white non-Hispanic Americans, exploring patterns and contributing factors to the troubling trend. Case and Deaton find that while midlife […] Read more »
Voting for the Five Percent
“Why don’t working class voters vote their economic interests?” has been a perennial question for generations of academics. (One might also ask why full professors don’t vote their interests–for tax-cutting conservatives.) Part of the problem in addressing the question is knowing whether the premise is correct. When unemployed coal miners […] Read more »