Election from an informational perspective

 

Now that the mid-term elections are all but over it is time to assess the results and look at the information that was available.  From these we can see how the public disseminated that information and how it affected the results.  If it had any affect at all.  I do intend this to be a commentary on the issues but an analysis of what decisions people made with the information available.  I only have time and space to analyze the general issues and results.  

To summarize, going into the election inflation appeared to be the main issue.  the previously identified Pew Research article states that "The economy has consistently been the top issue for voters this year.  Also the party in power has historically failed miserably in mid-term elections.  This discontent coupled with the history of mid-term elections led many to predict a "red wave".    This meant that the republicans would control the house and the senate.  There were many predictions of a 30 - 40 seat swing in the house and 5 - 6 senate seats flipping.  As we have come to learn The red wave became a mere trickle.  It appears that the Republicans will barely control the house and the Democrats will maintain a slim senate majority.  So what did the voters do with the information leading up to the election?

I was once told that any event in the past can be made to seem inevitable to a competent historian.  I am not going to pretend that this is some kind of deep dive into the data pre and post election.  I am interested in what kind of information was available to voters and make some possible assertions as to how they decided who to vote for.

Looking at the chart from the pew research article the first thing that jumps out at me is the spread between republicans and democrats.  13 of the 18 issues have spreads of more than 10.  This represents two thirds of the issues.  According to the article this is quite normal.  I am even skeptical of the ones that have a low spread.  For example energy policy is listed as important by 63% of democrats and republicans.  However their views are probably quite different.  Democrats in general would want policies that favor green energy where as republicans favor fossil fuels.  The gun policy numbers may be subject to the same affect.  Democrats wanting more strict policies and republicans wanting less strict policies.

Since the outcome of the election resulted in very little change.  Republicans appear destined to have a very slight majority in the house while Democrats maintain control of the senate.  One could argue that people voted for the status quo.  Given the poor approval ratings of the current administration this would seem unlikely.  It is assumed that the populations maintain the status quo when things are going well.  I don't think that this assumption is correct.  The status quo could also be better than the alternative.  Or people may choose the status quo when they are unsure of the alternative.  I really think this is the case.

This is supported by the last point in the pew article.  This states that neither party has provided clear plans for the country.  I believe that voters went in to the voting booth with the negative issues about inflation, crime, abortion, etc.  Issues that are not simple to fix .  Not having a clear plan as to how these things would get fixed they went with the status quo.