Wormless Gourd
cringenat
Jr. Member
Posts: 298
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« on: April 12, 2021, 03:47:37 PM » |
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The conditions that spawned them aren't around for most people anymore, so many of them are very old and their children lack the same economic and social context to vote/think like them. Post-war economic boom gave a lot of people the ability to rise to middle class or upper middle class status without leaning heavily into education, generational wealth or for many even a labor organization.
In addition, they'd often have military backgrounds(tens of millions of conscripted men served 1940-1950s) and many were migrants from the rural Midwest or South(such as in SoCal), susceptible to post-war religious revivals, often working in jobs that aren't nearly as plentiful now, particularly defense and the countless industries that grew from defense spending. Often the values that these things confer stuck with people regardless of their social mobility and was particularly turned up under Nixon and Reagan.
Defense spending declines precipitously, degree requirement for jobs grew, new generations of degree'd liberals begin to live in the same neighborhood(often their own children) and the industry of universities, technology and social services begin to inform the opinions of those newcomers.
There still are newly-minted, wealthy arch-conservatives but they tend to move to the exurbs for both self-sorting(often on industry lines, like law enforcement) and greater political representation. Most however are still very old and most suburbs will continue to lose members of that generation in favor of degree'd liberals coming into ascendant industries.
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