From the Pew Research Center: Behind Trump’s victory: Divisions by race, gender, education

Expect lot's of analysis in the coming days.

Here's a look at the divides that revealed themselves in Tuesday's election in comparison to previous elections.

- Click here for the article.

And some nice helpful graphs:

Medical cost are rising because we have more old people.

Other than that, medical costs are pretty steady. Graphic from Wonkblog:



The story the chart is pulled from can be found here. Here's the basic point the study makes:

The latest CBO report, which takes into account three consecutive years of dramatically slower health care cost increases, should serve as a warning (and a reminder) that it is misleading to say the problem with the federal budget “is just a health care problem.”
If one only looks at the two CBO updates over the last six months, projected 10-year Medicare spending has been revised downward by $306 billion. Projected Medicaid spending has been revised downward by $273 billion (not counting revised estimates of lower Medicaid enrollment due to the Supreme Court’s ruling on Medicaid expansion in the Affordable Care Act (ACA)).
Yet even under that “better case scenario,” federal outlays for health care will soon be greater than outlays for Social Security -- placing it at the top of all federal budgetary commitments. Over the 10-year budget window, health care spending will experience growth of 1.2 percent of GDP, second fastest only to net interest.
The reason is simply that the “health care problem” actually reflects the large increase in the number of people who will become eligible for Medicare due to the retirement of the baby-boom generation. Over the next 10 years, 18 million new beneficiaries are expected to sign up for Medicare.
Nearly three-quarters of the spending increases in Medicare over the next two decades can be attributed to aging alone. And, as I will explain, the remaining increase in costs due to health care inflation will be very difficult to avoid because even that amount of projected growth is lower than anyone realistically believes we can sustainably achieve. Thus, the major problem in Medicare really is one of an aging population. In this case, the Medicare problem is no different than the Social Security problem.

From the Guardian: Will 2012 see the most divided American electorate ever?

The author walks through recent polling information and points out that in most areas where it matters, a large divide has developed between those who support Romney and those who support Obama. This is worth a discussion in class - what does this mean about the governability of the nation at this moment in time?

I'll point out one of his findings, the developing age gap:

In 2008, those 60 years and older supported John McCain by a 4-point margin, while those 18-29 voted for Obama by a 34-point margin. This 38-point age gap was the largest gap since exit polls were first taken in 1972.

It would probably surprise you to learn that the age gap is a relatively recent phenomenon. There was no relation between age and voting patterns in 1992, for instance. Today, the Greatest Generation has been replaced by the much more conservative "silent generation". Today's younger voters are 40% non-white, a core Democratic group, and those who are white grew up during the Bush years.

The result is that the age gap is larger today than it was even four years ago. A recent GWU/Battleground Politico poll has Obama holding a large 24-point lead among 18-29 year-olds, and trailing among those 60-plus by 18 points.

Census Report: Incomes Rise only for the Old

This could lead to a seismic political shift:

The incomes of the young and middle-aged — especially men — have fallen off a cliff since 2000, leaving many age groups poorer than they were even in the 1970s, a USA TODAY analysis of new Census data found.

People 54 or younger are losing ground financially at an unprecedented rate in this recession, widening a gap between young and old that had been expanding for years.
While the young have lost ground, older people have grown more prosperous over the years and the decades. Older women have done best of all.

The dividing line between those getting richer or poorer: the year 1955. If you were born before that, you're part of a generation enjoying a four-decade run of historic income growth. Every generation after that is now sinking economically.

Household income for people in their peak earning years — between ages 45 and 54 — plunged $7,700 to $64,349 from 2000 through 2008, after adjusting for inflation. People in their 20s and 30s suffered similar drops. Older people enjoyed all the gains.

This coupled with the extra attention older Americans are paying to health care reform, sue to concerns it will harm them specifically, makes me wonder if age differences in political opinions are becoming more acute.