Oconee County, GA

[Roll Roons]

Oconee is 53.5% college educated, the third highest of any county in Georgia after Fulton and Forsyth. By median household income, it's the second richest county in the state after Forsyth.

Why is it so educated (even more than neighboring Clarke, which is actually home to UGA) and wealthy?

[GAinDC]

Oconee is 53.5% college educated, the third highest of any county in Georgia after Fulton and Forsyth. By median household income, it's the second richest county in the state after Forsyth.

Why is it so educated (even more than neighboring Clarke, which is actually home to UGA) and wealthy?

A lot of the highly paid university staff live out there and commute into Athens

[100% pro-life no matter what]

It has a big lake, and it's popular for well-off families to buy a house on the lake.  And, well-off lake precincts in the South tend to be incredibly Republican to this day.  My mom has a house on Lake Murray in Lexington County, SC, which has a similar dynamic.

[mileslunn]

Unlike others with such high attainment still goes quite heavily Republican however I noticed that college educated whites in Deep South unlike rest of country still very much Republican.  Just maybe not as lopsided as those without college degree.  Its only in big cities or areas with lots of transplants which Oconee County is neither that Democrats are competitive or ahead amongst whites in South.  For most part in Deep South, its race not education that is biggest dividing line.

[NorCalifornio]

It has a big lake, and it's popular for well-off families to buy a house on the lake.  And, well-off lake precincts in the South tend to be incredibly Republican to this day.  My mom has a house on Lake Murray in Lexington County, SC, which has a similar dynamic.

I can't find the lake on Google Maps, are you sure you aren't thinking of Oconee County, SC?

[Sol]

This is something I've often wondered about too, especially given how dramatically different precincts on either side of the county line vote--it's a much more dramatic dropoff than you'd expect from looking at the map.

[100% pro-life no matter what]

It has a big lake, and it's popular for well-off families to buy a house on the lake.  And, well-off lake precincts in the South tend to be incredibly Republican to this day.  My mom has a house on Lake Murray in Lexington County, SC, which has a similar dynamic.

I can't find the lake on Google Maps, are you sure you aren't thinking of Oconee County, SC?

You know what, Lake Oconee isn't actually in Oconee County.  I assumed it was.  My bad.

[King of Kensington]

Unlike others with such high attainment still goes quite heavily Republican however I noticed that college educated whites in Deep South unlike rest of country still very much Republican.  Just maybe not as lopsided as those without college degree.  Its only in big cities or areas with lots of transplants which Oconee County is neither that Democrats are competitive or ahead amongst whites in South.  For most part in Deep South, its race not education that is biggest dividing line.

Indeed college-educated whites voted 60%+ Republican in 2020 in the 5 Deep South states.

[ReaganLimbaugh]

As a UGA grad I can tell you that Hypocrite Liberals don't want their children anywhere near the super violent, drug infested Clarke County (Athens) Schools.  I have had friends that were teacher in clarke county and they are worse than terrible.

its a white flight county.

[Schiff for Senate]

It has a big lake, and it's popular for well-off families to buy a house on the lake.  And, well-off lake precincts in the South tend to be incredibly Republican to this day.  My mom has a house on Lake Murray in Lexington County, SC, which has a similar dynamic.

Indeed, Lexington County's quite the Republican stronghold for such a populous county.

[mileslunn]

Suburbs and exurbs of smaller cities in south still solidly Republican.  Its only in large metro areas like Atlanta or Dallas Democrats are competitive in suburbs and even there most of those are fairly diverse too.  If you look at precinct data in Tarrant, Collin, and Denton counties, Trump generally got north of 70% in the heavily white areas while lost to Biden in more diverse parts.  With Atlanta metro area, most suburbs flipped due to being less white as DeKalb County and maybe Fulton county are only ones Biden likely won white vote.  DeKalb county has a few major colleges while Fulton County includes Atlanta proper which is strongly Democrat amongst all races.

[Del Tachi]

Oconee County is mostly married White college grads with children at home, which is still a mostly Republican demographic at the national level and especially in the South.

There's a very different composition of college educated voters in bigger cities/nearer suburbs, where they tend to be younger, less White and less likely to be married/have kids.

[Arizona Iced Tea]

Georgia is the last battleground or swing state remaining where college educated white women vote significantly more Republican than the state at large does. The only other state similar is Texas, but even there the margin with college white women is roughly on par with the statewide margin.

[Spectator]

It’ll be interesting to see how southern, heavily white suburban areas swing after Trump is no longer on the scene. I think the longer he stays relevant that these kinds of places like Oconee, Columbia, Houston, and Forsyth counties slowly but surely continue to drift left. The older voters in Columbia County are almost all white and probably 90%+ Republican, and I don’t think the voters replacing them will match that.

[Sol]

Oconee County is mostly married White college grads with children at home, which is still a mostly Republican demographic at the national level and especially in the South.

There's a very different composition of college educated voters in bigger cities/nearer suburbs, where they tend to be younger, less White and less likely to be married/have kids.

The issue is less that it's Republican and more that it's Republican in a way which is highly correlated with county lines.



The area in gold is pretty close to downtown Athens, in much the same way as the areas in red. But all of the former remain GOP, while the latter is still D. Is it related to the school systems? Is the river a massive psychological and cultural barrier? What's the deal?

[kwabbit]

Growth in Oconee County has been recent, so if White Flight was a factor then it’s more recent and thus more R. I can’t speak that much about the character of Athens as I’ve never been there, but what is the townie population like? It might be like Tuscaloosa where outside of the college students it’s a mostly non-White town and there’s a typical Deep South racial divide in the area at large. A lot of college towns are also deceptively diverse and low SES, where the year-round population might be heavily non-White but that gets drowned out by the student population, both in the census/ACS and in elections, which of course happen in November. In NJ, for example, New Brunswick is supermajority Latino and virtually no one under 18 is White, but it doesn’t really carry that reputation. Athens seems to have a reputation as a more hip and college-y place than NB, but the point might still stand.

[Del Tachi]

Oconee County is mostly married White college grads with children at home, which is still a mostly Republican demographic at the national level and especially in the South.

There's a very different composition of college educated voters in bigger cities/nearer suburbs, where they tend to be younger, less White and less likely to be married/have kids.

The issue is less that it's Republican and more that it's Republican in a way which is highly correlated with county lines.



The area in gold is pretty close to downtown Athens, in much the same way as the areas in red. But all of the former remain GOP, while the latter is still D. Is it related to the school systems? Is the river a massive psychological and cultural barrier? What's the deal?

The outer neighborhoods of Athens (epescially on the north and east sides) are significantly more Black/Latino than the downtown areas, which are more student dominanted.  Oconee County is laughably White (>80%.)

As to why Athens developed that way...downtown Athens back during the 1970s-90s was a real rough place.  Growth at UGA added a lot of development pressure (student apartments/condos) in the downtown core, which displaced poorer Black residents into less central neighborhoods.  This probably created a cascading effect where White families then fled outer Athens for Oconee, which over time developed better schools than Athens.

[EastAnglianLefty]

Using the Inner Loop as a boundary, the centre of Athens is 65.5% white and 21.4% black. Outer Clarke county is 48.2% white and 30.2% black. Oconee County is 82.5% white and 5.5% black.

[NorCalifornio]

Growth in Oconee County has been recent, so if White Flight was a factor then it’s more recent and thus more R. I can’t speak that much about the character of Athens as I’ve never been there, but what is the townie population like? It might be like Tuscaloosa where outside of the college students it’s a mostly non-White town and there’s a typical Deep South racial divide in the area at large. A lot of college towns are also deceptively diverse and low SES, where the year-round population might be heavily non-White but that gets drowned out by the student population, both in the census/ACS and in elections, which of course happen in November. In NJ, for example, New Brunswick is supermajority Latino and virtually no one under 18 is White, but it doesn’t really carry that reputation. Athens seems to have a reputation as a more hip and college-y place than NB, but the point might still stand.

There was a thread on Athens recently where the general consensus seemed to be that the townie population (whites included) was more Democratic than the student population.

[Devils30]

It’ll be interesting to see how southern, heavily white suburban areas swing after Trump is no longer on the scene. I think the longer he stays relevant that these kinds of places like Oconee, Columbia, Houston, and Forsyth counties slowly but surely continue to drift left. The older voters in Columbia County are almost all white and probably 90%+ Republican, and I don’t think the voters replacing them will match that.

Forsyth will get a lot of college educated transplants and should keep moving left. But it will be interesting if the others drift back to the right, (perhaps with an assist from a Democratic party that moves too far left).

[ReaganLimbaugh]

Growth in Oconee County has been recent, so if White Flight was a factor then it’s more recent and thus more R. I can’t speak that much about the character of Athens as I’ve never been there, but what is the townie population like? It might be like Tuscaloosa where outside of the college students it’s a mostly non-White town and there’s a typical Deep South racial divide in the area at large. A lot of college towns are also deceptively diverse and low SES, where the year-round population might be heavily non-White but that gets drowned out by the student population, both in the census/ACS and in elections, which of course happen in November. In NJ, for example, New Brunswick is supermajority Latino and virtually no one under 18 is White, but it doesn’t really carry that reputation. Athens seems to have a reputation as a more hip and college-y place than NB, but the point might still stand.

Its really the uncivilized high crime an ultra liberalism from Athens Clarke County.  Just ask the parents of Laken Riley

https://www.accgov.com/DocumentCenter/View/87246/Resolution---Support-of-Athens-Immigrant-Undocumented-and-Latinx-Community-8202019