IN AARP: Donnelly +3 among 50+ voters

[pbrower2a]

Indiana's suburbs have been more strongly R than the rest of the country, as in Arizona, Georgia, and Texas -- but not as in neighboring Illinois, Michigan, and Ohio. The first group of states seem to be going much more D, and the only voters that I can imagine going more D in those states are suburban voters in those states.  Republicans have done well at holding onto them until Donald Trump has made a travesty of the low-tax, free-market conservatism that such voters like in those states. Trump may be losing them.

So why are Indiana's suburbs (mostly around Indianapolis) politically more like those of Arizona, Georgia, or Texas? Very simply, those states have newer suburbs than those of such states as Illinois, Michigan, Ohio... or California, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania. New suburbs have low maintenance costs and still have some rural characteristics, even in ethnic mix. As suburbs age, the maintenance costs rise as the original infrastructure approaches its original service life. Schools and other public buildings become obsolete. As single-family houses about 70 years old (those are the houses that returning WWII vets bought on GI or VA loans) get replaced by apartment complexes, traffic becomes heavier, and roads must be rebuilt to accommodate the large volume of cars that apartment complexes generate.

Don't forget -- apartment-dwellers tend to be more socialistic in their attitudes. They see their landlords solely as rent-collectors, and they are more than willing to push higher school millages so that their children are not consigned to poverty. Apartment complexes make a suburb much more urban and much less urban. They are more diverse in ethnicity than home-owners.

[pbrower2a]

Thats right Donnelly...keep driving that RV

The RV industry is big in Indiana, and in 2008 it got burned by a combination of high interest rates, a credit crunch, and a spike in gas prices. RVs are expensive purchases often made on credit or from the sale of houses (related to the overall economy), and they devour huge amounts of motor fuels. The economic meltdown hurt the RV industry, and Obama did freakishly well in the counties on the Michigan border in 2008.

An RV is a costly, environmentally-destructive vehicle, but it is also how many Hoosiers make their living -- working to build them.

[pbrower2a]

Does anyone actually take the time to read pbrower’s multi-paragraph responses

I certainly do.

At this point the 2020 looks largely like demographics -- winning or squandering certain demographics.