Category Archives: Politics

Considering “polls gone wild”

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The Associated Press released a story yesterday with this headline: “Polls gone wild: Political gripes in Internet age.” It is an interesting read about the role polls have played in the 2010 election season and I have a few interpretations regarding the story.

1. The griping of politicians about polls does not often seem to be based on the methodology of the poll. Rather, I think the politicians are trying to curry favor with supporters and voters who are also suspicious of polls. I would guess many Americans are suspicious of polls because they think they can be manipulated (which is true) and then throw out all poll results (when there are methods that make the polls better or worse). Some of this could be dealt with by dealing with innumeracy and educating citizens about how good polls are done.

2. There is a claim that earlier polls affect later polls and elections and that overall, polls help determine election outcomes. Are there studies that prove this? Or is this just more smoke and mirrors from politicians?

3. If there are charges to be made about manipulation, it sounds like the political campaigns are manipulating the figures more than the reputable polling firms which are aiming to be statistically sound.

4. Stories like this remind me of the genius of RealClearPolitics.com where multiple polls about the same races are put side by side. If one doesn’t trust polls as much, just look at how polls compare over time. The more reputable companies show generally similar results over time. Basing news stories and campaign literature on just one poll may look silly in a few years with all of these companies producing numerous polls on almost a daily basis.

Still issues regarding welfare and poverty to be solved

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Even though the welfare debate in America has been limited recently (or perhaps people think it was a relic of the Clinton presidency), several new books have been published challenging the idea that there are not problems still to be solved. One of the books found that those who were once on welfare but then took jobs did not come out ahead:

But Stretched Thin challenges this supposed success story. Even in the prosperous economy of the late 1990s, it shows, finding a job was not usually a ticket out of poverty. Co-authors Sandra Morgen, an anthropologist, and Joan Acker, a sociologist, both at the University of Oregon, and Jill Weigt, a sociologist at California State University, San Marcos, surveyed more than 900 people, most of them white single mothers, who were taken off the rolls in Oregon or denied welfare benefits in early 1998. They found that more than half — 55 percent — wound up taking jobs that paid wages at or below the poverty line. Two years later, the authors found, nearly half still had family incomes below the poverty line.

If the goal of the welfare reform was to help people move permanently out of poverty, these books suggest there is a lot more work to do. And now with more Americans living in poverty, this could be the time to start working on the complex set of challenges.

Why American road sign lettering will change: better readability

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The Infrastructurist sums up the research behind the change to federal policies about road sign lettering. Road signs in coming years will need to be changed to move away from all CAPS in order to improve readability, particularly at night:

The shift reflects years of research into how drivers—particularly the elderly—react to road signs. In the late 1990s researchers at Penn State’s Pennsylvania Transportation Institute compared traditional highway signs to those with mixed-case Clearview lettering. They sat people age 65 to 83 in the front seat of a Ford Probe and approached a sign until the person could read it, repeating the tests with various fonts in both daytime and night.

The results, as the name Clearview suggests, were clear. Mixed-font Clearview was readable from roughly 440 feet away, whereas typical all-cap lettering was readable only at a distance of 384 feet. By expanding the interior spaces of certain letters, Clearview also reduced halanation—the process by which letters blur together late at night. In darkness Clearview became readable at 387 feet, against 331 for the standard highway font style.

All told the researchers found a 16 percent increase in readability with Clearview. On a typical 55 m.p.h. highway this translates into “two more seconds to read and respond to a sign,” they concluded in a 1998 report.

While this will cost money in the short term, it should lead to an improved driving experience. But it is also interesting how an issue like this can become fodder for political debates about how much money the government should be spending.

Mortgage interest tax deduction being discussed

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With the federal government looking for more money, a budget deficit commission has been discussing possible changes to the tax code to bring in more revenue. One option among a number of options: limiting or revoking the mortgage interest deduction.

Whatever this commission recommends, I can imagine the political fights that may ensue.

Brand favorites by political party

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AdvertisingAge reports on the favorite brands of Republicans and Democrats. There are some differences between supporters of the two parties:

The Republican Top 10: Fox News Channel, History Channel, Craftsman, Discovery Channel, Johnson & Johnson, UPS, Fox, FedEx, Lowe’s, Cheerios.

The Democrat Top 10: Google, Sony, Discovery Channel, UPS, Craftsman, Johnson & Johnson, Cheerios, History Channel, FedEx, Amazon.

Some interesting differences, particularly the presence of Google and Fox News Channel. Do these company’s political contributions match up with their favored status among each party?

Different definitions for welfare

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Apparently the gubernatorial race in Maine has included discussions about how welfare provided by the government might be defined differently:

“Essentially, we all get welfare in some fundamental form or another,” said Luisa Deprez, a sociology professor at the University of Maine.

Unemployment, Social Security, school lunches, subsidized college loans and even federal tax refunds can be considered forms of public assistance, according to those who favor a broader definition.

In the context of the gubernatorial campaign, however, welfare has been discussed in its more common, narrow definition: public anti-poverty programs that help provide basic needs, such as food and shelter.

I’ve other studies that suggest the public favors government intervention more when it is called something like “government assistance” as opposed to “welfare.”

This is a reminder that there are very few people who really want no government involvement in the lives of individuals. In reality, people who are supposedly at different ends of the political spectrum are debating how much government should be involved. How many people, of any political persuasion, are willing to completely give up unemployment benefits, Social Security, or Medicare?

A conundrum: Americans see entititlement programs as growing problem but don’t support available solutions

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Gallup reports that a majority of Americans see entitlement programs, such as Social Security and Medicare, creating large financial problems for the country in 25 years. Yet, a poll from several months ago showed that Americans did not support some of the main options for helping the finances of Social Security developed by the Congressional Budget Office.

I always find this to be an interesting situation: people agree something should be done but the available options do not appeal to a majority. Looking for and then applying patterns from situations where  solutions are developed would seem to be worthwhile. Are there sociological studies that address this?

Whoever can find a way through this will be deserving of lots of credit. Complicating the issue is the generation gap: issues like Social Security and Medicare tend to fire up older voters, who vote in larger proportions already.

Another creative way to raise suburban tax revenue: a “toilet tax”

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Nassau County, New York is considering a new tax that will bring in revenue from non-profit organizations:

Critics call the sewer fee — a “toilet tax” in Nassau County. Next year’s budget — for the first time — calls for previously tax-exempt public school districts, library districts and fire districts to increase their budgets, raise taxes, and, they fear, pass along the financial burden to taxpayers.

Democrats in the legislature are blasting the Republican county executive’s proposed “water usage fee”– that would charge one penny per gallon of water entering Nassau’s sewage system. They claim it would bankrupt hospitals, schools and more…

But the county executive said his sewer reforms would eventually lower rates for homeowners and businesses.

“I inherited a sewer district authority that’s $28 million out of balance. Nowhere else in New York state do not-for-profits get a free ride,” County Executive Ed Mangano said.

Even in the best of times, suburban communities may not enjoy the tax-exempt status of non-profit organizations. But with less favorable economic times, it is likely more communities will be looking for new revenue sources.

Although it sounds like this discussion may have just become another political issue (one party versus the other in Nassau County), these sorts of discussions will be taking place in many more suburbs across the country.

David Brooks asks: will anyone want to run for political office?

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In his latest column, David Brooks profiles Illinois Republican Senatorial candidate Mark Kirk. After going through his strong points and suggesting that it seems like Kirk would make an ideal candidate, he then goes into Kirk’s embellishment of his service record. And how the Illinois campaign has turned into what some people have called “the liar-liar campaign.”

And then Brooks brings up a logical point: if this is what happens in politics, who will want to run in the future?

The reality is, Kirk has led a life that is extremely impressive in most respects. The oddest thing about him is that he’s willing to go through this process. And the larger question is: In the years ahead, how many other talented people will be willing to do it, too?

While the prospect of doing good or being in power will always appeal to some, will the process become so unpleasant that the people who make good and reasonable candidates no longer desire to run? This is something to watch in the coming years.

Americans, upward mobility, elitism

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Anne Applebaum at Slate thinks about a common tactic in this election season: decrying “elites” or “elitism.” Why exactly are some political figures derided for taking advantage of America’s meritocracy?

Despite pushing aside the old WASP establishment—not a single WASP remains on the Supreme Court—these modern meritocrats are clearly not admired, or at least not for their upward mobility, by many Americans. On the contrary—and as Bell might have predicted—they are resented as “elitist.” Which is at some level strange. To study hard, to do well, to improve yourself—isn’t that the American dream? The backlash against graduates of “elite” universities seems particularly odd given that the most elite American universities have made the greatest effort to broaden their student bodies.

These ideas about elites and elitism do seem tied to particular colleges and settings, like Ivy League schools. Could a political candidate attack make an effective charge of elitism versus someone who had done really well with an advanced degree from a state school?

Another problem could be anti-intellectualism. Leaders who were able to work their way through top schools may be regarded differently than leaders who worked their way up through the business or political ladder. The intellectual is not as prized in America (think of the attention “public intellectuals” receive in American life compared to other groups of people) and may not be seen as the same kind of “self-made person.” Perhaps this could be tied into Bourdieu’s ideas about the differences among those with lots of capital: there is a split between those with educational capital and those with economic capital.