Alpine County, CA

[Franknburger]

Typical ski resort.  Most ski resorts tend to be quite liberal compared to surrounding areas.  Places like Blaine County in Idaho and Teton County in Wyoming have swung quite heavily towards the Democrats.  Likewise Pitkin county in Colorado went over 2/3 for Obama and it is a fairly white county.  Summit county in Utah, which has a lot of ski resorts but has a high Mormon population by contrast didn't totally follow this as swung massively towards Obama in 2008, but then in 2012 swung right back, although it would be interesting to see a precinct breakdown and see how much of that came from towns not connected to ski resorts.

But why are the ski resorts so liberal? Latino room-maids and kitchen-aids? Lots of aged hippies that have moved in to sell self-photographed postcards? Or locals getting concerned about climate change possibly eroding their income base (and increasing the risk of landslides sweeping away their homes)?

[Franknburger]

Typical ski resort.  Most ski resorts tend to be quite liberal compared to surrounding areas.  Places like Blaine County in Idaho and Teton County in Wyoming have swung quite heavily towards the Democrats.  Likewise Pitkin county in Colorado went over 2/3 for Obama and it is a fairly white county.  Summit county in Utah, which has a lot of ski resorts but has a high Mormon population by contrast didn't totally follow this as swung massively towards Obama in 2008, but then in 2012 swung right back, although it would be interesting to see a precinct breakdown and see how much of that came from towns not connected to ski resorts.

But why are the ski resorts so liberal? Latino room-maids and kitchen-aids? Lots of aged hippies that have moved in to sell self-photographed postcards? Or locals getting concerned about climate change possibly eroding their income base (and increasing the risk of landslides sweeping away their homes)?

Think of the Green voters in big European cities. (Brighton, Berlin, Paris...)

Thinking of such voters would make me understand why surfing hotspots are liberal. The typical ski coach, however, would have grown up in the region (i.e  have a rural background), and rather fit the (republican-leaning) "some college" than the (democrat-leaning) "post-graduate" education strata.

[Franknburger]

The typical ski coach is some guy which grew in a city and loved ski and so moved in a ski resort and got a job to fund his passion.

And even more importantly here, the city the ski or snowboard instructor (snowboarding is more popular than skiing these days) would have came from would be the Bay Area. Making them even more likely to be Democrat and hold very socially liberal views.

And if not from the Bay Area, he would be from Denver or Boulder - I got your point.
However - what percentage of the total resort population are we talking about here? Probably less than 5%, so there must be other factors at work as well.

[Franknburger]

The typical ski coach is some guy which grew in a city and loved ski and so moved in a ski resort and got a job to fund his passion.

And even more importantly here, the city the ski or snowboard instructor (snowboarding is more popular than skiing these days) would have came from would be the Bay Area. Making them even more likely to be Democrat and hold very socially liberal views.

And if not from the Bay Area, he would be from Denver or Boulder - I got your point.
However - what percentage of the total resort population are we talking about here? Probably less than 5%, so there must be other factors at work as well.

There aren't many people actually living there and even less are voting. You'll have your hotels and food service but those are also Democratic-leaning constituencies.

There aren't many people in Alpine, CA. But other resort areas are more populous:

Summit, CO      15,312 votes, 61% Obama, (84% white non-Latino)
Pitkin, CO         10,075 votes , 68% Obama, (88% white non-Latino)
Chaffee, CO      10,462 votes, 48.6% Obama (87% white non-Latino)
Gunnison. CO     8,667 votes, 58,2& Obama (89 % white non-Latino)
Teton, WY        11.464 votes, 54.2% Obama (82% white non-Latino)
 

[Franknburger]

The concept that 'drifter kids of the people who visit there' is in any way a measurable demographic of ski towns.......wowzers.

Good idea! This means that the 20-34 age group should be overrepresented, at the expense of the "under 19" and "over 65" age groups.

Checking this with 2010 census data on the four Cololorado counties named above, i.e. Pitkin, Summit, Chaffee and Gunnison, however, it turns out that reality is more complicated:

• Summit and Gunnison fit the criteria, with 28% of the total population between 20 and 34 years (Colorado average is 21%), and only 19% (Summit) and 23% (Gunnison) below 20 (Colorado: 27%).
• In Pitkin and Chaffee, however, the 20-34 cohort, as the below 20s, are strongly under-represented. Instead, the 50-64 age group is dominating (26%, vs. 19% state average). Chaffee also houses a large number of seniors (20%, vs. 11% state average) Demographically, these two counties rather look like typical rural out-migration regions - and still they vote strongly Democrat.

In Pitkin and Summit, I also noted above-average percentages of foreign-born residents (11% and 13%) and "other than English spoken at home" (16%), which cannot be explained by the Latino population share alone. European (alpine) immigration (ski coaches, hotel management, chefs, etc) ?