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A history of exit polls

Now more than ever, this country feels divided. It seems impossible to sort signal from noise and to understand the events and data from the election past. This is a brief history of the exit poll data from the Edison Research Exit Polls via NY Times, Cornell Roper Center, and CNN dating back to 1972, in an effort to understand how our divisions have shifted and changed during election season.



You can tap or click any of the below charts for a larger view.

To begin, let’s look at how men and women voted for the republican and democratic parties’ candidates:

Voters by Sex

What's evident here is that the difference in preference to vote for the Republican or Democrat candidate between men and women has been growing larger over the past three decades. More men tend to be voting republican and more women tend to be voting democrat.



In 1976 [Carter (D) vs Ford (R)], men and women voted in equal proportion. Again in 1992 [Clinton (D) vs Bush (R)], the gap closed, as it did again in 2008 [Obama (D) vs McCain (R)].



These instances, and a few other trends that become apparent in other parts of the data, suggest and ebb and flow of enthusiasm for the opposite party while out of power. More visible with men voting republican than women, democratic party presidencies tend to see sharp increases in men voting republican, as in the top left graphic between 1992-2000 and again in 2008-2016.

Voters by Race

A big part of the conversation, particularly in this election, is the way different racial demographic groups vote. The language describing different groups is taken from directly from the data. Let's take a look at how exit polls report on this:

As expected, the democratic party tends to appeal to minority voters. Additionally, the population of the vote is getting more diverse, although the white vote is still the majority today.



Let's line these data up to directly compare the the points leaning democrat or republican.

This shows preferences fairly clearly, although it does not tell the whole story.



Here is that same graph, but scaled to the percentage of the electorate:

So, even a moderate but not overwhelming preference (10-20 points) among white voters counter-balances a very strong minority preference. This is intuitive, but seeing it really puts it in perspective.

Voters by Race and Sex

The intersection of the the previous two sections -- sex and race -- is the next section. We know that men tend to vote more republican and women more democrat, and that minority votes tend to lean moderately or strongly democrat where the white vote is moderately republican leaning.

This checks out as we expected with a few notable exceptions such as the spike in the hispanic women vote during 2012.



To get context, here are those same data in a single chart:

What I've highlighted up above is the similarity in trend towards a stronger republican preference among white and black men. More slightly here you can see the waves of enthusiasm for or against the party currently in power. The white men voter preference leaned around 25 points republican in 2000 following Bill Clinton (1992-2000), but then diminished to just 16 points during the Bush era (2000-2008). Similarly, points leaning republican markedly increased during Barack Obama's tenure (2008-2016) in white and black men.

Voters by Age

This data going back to 1992 is one of the more straightforward groups. There are subtle waves for/against the party in power in the two younger brackets, although the older groups tend not to display that pattern. Overall, the age brackets get more conservative with older age, although this was a reversal for the 65+ bracket starting in the 2004 election.

Voters by Education

Education is probably the most dynamic data set of the exit polls. Not only have the populations of different education levels changed dramatically over the past three decades, but groups like college graduates that were once a conservative bastion are now in flux.



As with previous data sets, you can see waves of increasing republican preference during democrat presidents (1992-1996 and 2008-2016) and vice versa (2000-2008), primarily in the high school and some college groups. This may be, similar to the age data set, due to a younger group having more variable voting concerns whereas an older group, which would intuitively be more degree-holding, have more established voting criterea.

Voters by Income

Last but certainly not least, income and economics have been the one of the top talking points in thea post mortem of the election. This first part of the data was consistently pulled since 2000, but we'll look at a longer term scope in just a moment.

Like age, these data point to a positive relationship with conservatism: the higher the income, the higher the percentage voting republican. However, it is necessary to look at a longer scope to see some trends emerge more clearly.



The below graph pulls from multiple sources, and over time the income amounts polled have shifted.



The lower group usually represents incomes of a bit above the poverty line for a family of four -- this year that number is $24,300, and the lower group includes up to $30,000 income.



The lower-middle group moves into higher incomes, generally to a bit below the median income for the US. 2015 median income in the us was $55,775, and this group ranges from $30k-$50k.



The upper-middle and upper-groups track an average of the top brackets over time. These have shifted due to 1) inflation and 2) changing brackets and income groups in general. If you are looking for more specific data on income and voting preference rather than trends, I'd recommend Cornell's Roper Center.

What we see here is the strongest showing of a wave pattern in the data. The upper-middle and upper group are moving towards equal votes for democratic and republican party candidates, and waves of voter preference against parties in power across the board. Generally, lower income brackets lean more democrat than higher income brackets.

So, these data don't tell the whole story. There are complex, multi-level socio-economic currents in play, and I'd love your take on this data. What this overview reveals is that many demographic groups report in waves in exit polls, voting against the current party in power. This is most evident during the past three presidential tenures of Obama, Bush, and Clinton.



The story of how Americans choose who they believe will steer the country in the right direction is a complex one, but one we must understand to further the conversation and heal the divide we currently face.



Please email me with any comments, criticism, or ideas at Hello@Dylanhalpern.com