"College Educated" and voting

[mjr]

I asked this question the other day (on a comments section of an article), because I was genuinely curious, and got lambasted for it as "slamming college graduates".

It's not meant as a slam, at all, to college graduates, but merely a question of curiosity.

The question is fairly straightforward: Do college graduates (or "college educated" people), on the whole, make better voting decisions because they are college graduates (or "college educated")? And if so, why? And how do we know it's a "better voting decision"?

Keeping in mind that there are any number of degrees and majors one could earn in college. And some are, honestly, more difficult to acquire than others.

Is it something in the classes themselves? College culture? Do certain majors vote certain ways?

I mean, someone with a Journalism degree has to take several different classes than someone with, say, a Computer Science degree. That's no real indication of how they'll vote, one way or the other.

I'm not going into (or asking, for that matter) if they're smarter, or whatever. My focus is simply on their voting decisions.

And if it's the case that college educated individuals do (on the whole) make better voting decisions, why don't all college educated individuals vote the same way?

Because I've noticed that during the primaries they would always ask about "college educated" people and how they vote.

So I'm merely asking out of curiosity. Nothing more.

[Kheldarson]

Because I've noticed that during the primaries they would always ask about "college educated" people and how they vote.

So I'm merely asking out of curiosity. Nothing more.

Because there's a significant divide between how the college educated vote against the non-college educated. The college educated person typically has more exposure to a range of topics and ideas that are relevant to an election in terms of world view, the role of politics, legislative priorities, and likelihood to vote.

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank...e-republicans/

[jackfaire]

The College Degree doesn't in and of itself actually mean anything and that's the problem. These polls are only differentiating between Have/Have not. Not actually looking at what they have.

For example Blue Collar worker is polled "Does Trickle Down Economics work?"

"Of course it doesn't my boss made more profit this year than last year and cut my pay saying they had to make cuts all across the board because of lower profits the liar"

English major who works as an editor at a major publishing company who barely passed the only economics class she ever took in school asked the same question, "Does trickle down economics work"

"Well clearly it does I am making (x) amount of money I wouldn't be if it wasn't for my boss passing on increased profits" when if he looked he would find the company actually cut his wages twice when profits went up.

A college degree in and of itself is not a great indicator or a person's knowledge level or even how much they are paying attention.

The Blue Collar worker trying to support a family is more likely to know how the company is actually doing because how their pay shifts can affect a lot so they know when it's bullshit that the owner cuts pay to pocket more profit.

The latter is making enough money they don't have to worry about it. And these polls don't account for that.

Polls that pick one trait of yours to categorize you are badly done polls. College Graduates and non college graduates is way too general. In terms of "what they believe" and "what they know" it's not going to match up to everyone else.

The one thing that is pretty standard about College Grads even if they personally know they cheated, coasted, or just barely skidded by they develop this "My thoughts are smart because I have a degree thus my thoughts can't be wrong and I will not be swayed by you're obviously wrong facts"

This is why they don't all agree. Because many feel that they know as much as the experts because they got a degree that may not even be related to the issue and they are surrounded by a bunch of people who say "Well of course (X) isnt' a problem it shouldn't even be on a ballot" because for that group of people it's not a problem.