Wednesday, May 9, 2012

I'm not sayin' . . . I'm just sayin' (A possible explanation for why NC voted the way it did)

Yeah . . . there were some unhappy Facebook peeps this morning. Actually it started last night as the returns started coming in. So many friends were totally down in the dumps, especially the gay ones.

We heteros are weeping over the voluntary disregard of the American way, but our gay friends are taking a personal shot to the gut as well. I feel for them.

Anyway, as I scrolled through this morning I came upon a graphic that actually asked me to harken back to my undergraduate education and start thinking about empirical political theory instead of normative.

This is it:






Well sheesh . . . I have local knowledge, maybe I can help answer this question?!

I could just hazard some guesses and try to push it off like I'm a legitimate social scientist or something, but I thought maybe I should commit the time to the actual data. I mean, anyone can see that the Triangle went "Against", which suggests that maybe population density is a meaningful variable. But then you look over to the left at Watauga and Buncombe. Those aren't population centers. It's also not visible on this graphic, but Dare county - way out in the outer banks also voted "Against", so clearly it had nothing to do with density or topography.

So I took a little peek at the 2008 U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey and focused on education. When I reviewed "Percentage of adults between 24 - 64 years of age with a 2 or 4 year college degree" I noticed something veeerrrrrrrrrrryyyyyyyy interesting! but it was just a clue.

I needed specific county voting data in order to really see what I thought I saw, so I popped over to the North Carolina Board of Elections and spent a good 2 hours going county by county and tabulating the vote percentages from last night.

What did I discover?


First let me say that I did not do a thorough polimetric review of a vast dataset. If somebody wants me to pay me to do hardcore political science I will be far more thorough, but I think the little chunk of data that I charted says a little something. What does it say? I'm not going to comment on it. I'm going to show you the data table that I compiled here:

Education Data Source Election Data Source
County % of adults w/ 2 or 4 year degree % For % Against Majority Vote U.S. Census Bureau, 2008 American Community Survey North Carolina Board of Elections
Orange 63.4 21.06 78.94 Against
Wake 57.3 43.25 56.75 Against
Durham 51.4 30.24 69.76 Against
Mecklenburg 50.6 45.82 54.18 Against
New Hanover 48.1 50.23 49.77 For
Watauga 45.2 49.18 50.82 Against
Buncombe 41.9 48.51 51.49 Against
Chatham 41.4 46.13 53.87 Against
Forsyth 41.4 52.59 47.41 For
Guilford 41.2 50.03 49.97 For
Pitt 41.2 50.46 49.54 For
Moore 38.6 68.26 31.74 For
Dare 38.5 49.03 50.97 Against
Henderson 38.5 67.71 32.29 For
Union 36.6 76.52 23.48 For
Jackson 36.3 58.74 41.26 For
Cabarrus 36.1 69.99 30.01 For
Transylvania 35.2 62.02 37.98 For
Carteret 34.6 65.83 34.17 For
Cumberland 33.8 69.53 30.47 For
Haywood 32.9 72.22 27.78 For
Davie 32.7 72.79 27.21 For
Iredell 32.7 73.43 26.57 For
Craven 32.3 64.42 35.58 For
Macon 31.3 75.51 24.49 For
Alamance 30.2 64.04 35.96 For
Johnston 30 73.77 26.23 For
Nash 29.9 76.54 23.46 For
Catawba 29.4 74.22 25.78 For
Beaufort 29.3 77.57 22.43 For
Brunswick 28.8 64.63 35.37 For
Onslow 28.8 72.74 27.26 For
Gaston 28.7 76.68 23.32 For
Pasquotank 28.7 64.78 35.22 For
Harnett 28.2 58.48 41.52 For
Madison 28 70.43 29.57 For
Cherokee 27.6 78.16 21.84 For
Lee 27.6 70.35 29.65 For
Wilson 27.5 70.31 29.69 For
Stanly 27.4 80.52 19.48 For
Rutherford 27.1 81.08 18.92 For
Wayne 26.8 75.65 24.35 For
Davidson 26.7 74.58 25.42 For
McDowell 26.4 82.85 17.15 For
Pender 26.3 68.18 31.82 For
Burke 26.1 77.44 22.56 For
Granville 26 67.47 32.53 For
Lincoln 26 77.37 22.63 For
Hoke 25.9 65.07 34.93 For
Rowan 25.9 74.32 25.68 For
Hertford 25.5 70.11 29.89 For
Scotland 25.3 73.31 26.69 For
Currituck 25 67.8 32.2 For
Person 25 72.42 27.58 For
Cleveland 24.8 80.16 19.84 For
Surry 24.5 78.36 21.64 For
Columbus 24.4 85.06 14.94 For
Franklin 24.3 66.14 33.86 For
Martin 23.9 71 29 For
Lenoir 23.6 71.68 28.32 For
Richmond 23.6 77.39 22.61 For
Montgomery 22.7 76.52 23.48 For
Yadkin 22.7 82.45 17.55 For
Ashe 22.6 77.16 22.84 For
Caldwell 22.3 80.58 19.42 For
Alexander 22.2 85.99 14.01 For
Northampton 22.2 63.36 36.64 For
Bladen 21.8 83.27 16.73 For
Halifax 21.8 67.76 32.24 For
Wilkes 21.8 82.97 17.03 For
Rockingham 21.4 75.43 24.57 For
Randolph 21.1 80.49 19.51 For
Sampson 20 82.11 17.89 For
Robeson 19.4 86.23 13.77 For
Vance 19.4 73.02 26.98 For
Caswell 19 69.41 30.59 For
Duplin 19 78.16 21.84 For
Edgecombe 18.8 70.33 29.67 For
Stokes 18.2 77.75 22.25 For
Greene 18 72.41 27.59 For
Anson 15 69.58 30.42 For




Okay so that's that. It's data. Not too exciting to look at. Here's the graphic, which is a little more compelling:




Once again . . . I'm not interpreting this data at all, I'm just throwing it against the wall like a spit wad and letting you, the patron, the observer, the savvy consumer of information extract whatever you want from it.

I'm not suggesting there is any overarching truth the be learned, but if I were to toss out a crazy hypothesis, I might suggest that there's an inverse relationship between "education" and support of Amendment One.

That blue line above represents the education levels of each NC county included in the 2008 study in descending order. The jagged red line shows how each of those counties voted last night. As you can see, the red line trends higher (stronger support for Amendment 1) as the blue line trends lower (less education).

I tried to do this as a scatter plot with median lines but I couldn't get it to work so it's just a quick line chart.

The sharpest spike in support of the amendment seemed to occur right after the top 10 most educated counties in the state. Actually it was the top 11 because Pitt and Guilford counties are tied for #10 with 41.2% of adults having at least a 2 year degree.

I thought it would be interesting to average the 10 most educated counties in North Carolina and compare them to the 10 least educated counties in North Carolina and see how their voting patterns match up.


% of adults
w/ 2 - 4 year
degree
% For % Against Majority
Top 10 Most Educated Counties in NC 48.19 43.704 56.296 Against
Top 10 Least Educated Counties in NC 18.79 75.949 24.051 For




Well, well, well . . .

Looks like the 10 most educated counties in the state opposed the amendment 56% to 44%.

Also looks like the 10 least educated counties in the state were quite fond of the amendment. Quite fond indeed.


What does all of this mean?

I don't know man, probably nothing . . .

Probably absolutely nothing.


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