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The Representativeness of New Hampshire Voters

- January 6, 2012

Andrew Therriault:

In terms of race and ethnicity, NH is much more representative of the broader electorate than one might think. It is indeed much more likely to be white, non-hispanic, and native-born than the rest of the country, but in the context of analyzing the GOP primary, that hardly makes a difference—all three groups are similarly overrepresented among 2008 primary voters and made up the vast majority of this year’s caucusgoers as well.

With regard to age, education, and income, NH differs only modestly from national averages.

The biggest difference in terms of demographics is the low prevalence of evangelicals in NH, at less than half the national average.

Politically, NH residents are far more likely to call themselves independent than others, but this matters more in terms of identity than ideology: the number of self-identified conservatives is only slightly below the national average, and the proportion of those who call themselves “very conservative” is similar.

The much higher rate of independent identification does not mean NH is full of moderates—breaking the data down further (not shown), the percentage of respondents describing themselves as “moderate” is less than 4 points higher in NH than elsewhere. While there may be some differences in ideology, they’re not nearly as extreme as the party identification rates might suggest.

At the new and promising VU on Politics blog, from Vanderbilt’s Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions.