To be sick of this "all old people vote Tory" narrative

[WatchoRulo]

There really is no nuance to any debate when people make ill informed claims of this type.

Anecdotally from my friends and family - the only Tory voters are the younger people.

Factually - it's very obviously the case that not everyone over, say, 60 suddenly starts voting Tory.

Also - like the "old people without degrees all voted for Brexit", these claims are based on a statistical extrapolation, often from a very small sample size and are also based entirely on what people who were asked told the researchers. This "data" is from the very same polling organisations that failed to predict the outcome of the referendum, yet somehow some people have accepted their guesses as immutable truths and "facts".

We have a crap FPTP electoral system which means most people don't get what they vote for.

It's a secret ballot - the only way to know for certain the detailed demographics of who votes for what would be to check who actually voted for whom.

I am really fed up of the narrative that as a boomer (aged 60, still working and paying tax and NI by the way) I have deliberately shat on younger people all my life (why would I - I have a teenage DD).

I have personally never voted Tory and consider it vanishingly unlikely I ever would, and I recognise that I've had some lucky breaks from when I was born, but I haven't deliberately stolen from young people.

My jaw dropped at the ignorance.

Same @ArseInTheCoOpWindow. Never voted Tory and I’m a decade older than you.

The EEC referendum in 1975 gave a "remain" outcome.

That's the population now aged over 66 now

Only 23% of people in the UK have a degree.

Brexit and Tory go hand in hand, as does age in regard to voting for both - not a given but there is a very strong link.

It's the last acceptable prejudice, IMO, especially where women are concerned 'Boomer' and 'Karen' trotted out with tedious regularity.
Witness the recent thread about stupid old people don't drink enough water. Thank the lord we're young enough and smart enough to show them the way.

Degrees weren't such a vital thing when us fossils were younger.
Nurses, for one example, didn't need them. It's only in relatively recent years that it's been seen as essential.

Not sure why this zombie thread was resurrected, but tory polling for under-40s is now at historic lows. So the cliche is certainly coming true, whether it was before.

Anyone aged 66 now would have been barely old enough to vote in 1975, the majority who voted to remain would be dead by now, a 35 year old then would be 83 now.

In my family, it was those who witnessed first hand WW2 who voted to stay in, its their children who generally speaking voted to leave, without a clue what they were voting for, useful idiots springs to mind, manipulated to get the rich richer & Boris into No10.

I did some research with the local uni.

Brexit was a vote of education level more than anything else

Needed because modern nursing is a highly skilled job, my mum left the NHS because quite frankly, her skills were very much people based/caring and not so much medical, she struggled, yet in the 50s and 60s she did very well and became a Matron.

Modern medicine is completely different to yesteryear, she knew her limits and went into the care for the elderly and did very well.

So old people vote Tory and youngsters vote Labour nd this has always been so? I guess then all you youngsters who are moaning about old people realise that as you get older you will become Tory voters then.

Depends. The last 13 years have been such a clusterfuck it could be for the tories what the 70s were to Labour - something people experiencing it at the time are put off by no matter what generation they are.

I’ve become even more left wing as I’ve got older.

It's the enduring desire to "other" the blame

And to maintain the idea that the Tories are nasty (other parties make brave but necessary decisions, Tories are nasty, even if its the same issue!)

Ageism remains rife. Which is unfortunate

Ageism remains rife. Which is unfortunate

It’s not ageism, it’s statistically correct. That’s the unfortunate thing.

In the 2019 election -

57% of 60-69 year olds voted TORY, 22 % Labour, 11% Lib Dem
67% of 70+ year olds = Tory, 14% Lab, 11% Lib Dem

That's why people think older people vote Tory, because statistically they DO vote Tory.
But good for you if you're one of the 33% of over 70s whe didn't.

It doesn't change the fact tat older people, who are more reliant on public services, NHS, Pensions, public transport are voting for a party who are starving the very things they need of money.

I am really fed up of the narrative that as a boomer (aged 60, still working and paying tax and NI by the way) I have deliberately shat on younger people all my life (why would I - I have a teenage DD).

You personally may not have but it's an undeniable fact that boomers and Xers have overseen the decimation of the environment and biodiversity, and are the ones who failed to invest sufficiently I'm the future.

It's not wrong that younger generations are angry at you as a collective generation, especially as your generations STILL refuse to change and constantly derail or put barriers in the way of any attempt to enact change.

The number one concern of u40s is climate change, by a considerable distance, followed by concern over the level of inequalities present in society.

How do those in positions of power (primarily boomers and Xers) respond? With half arsed promises and pledges and very little action.

Same with my parents. As a military family they were Conservative voters for generations and against things like gay marriage. But gradually became more tolerant as they got older (and accepted reasoned arguments). But it was the Brexit campaign that stopped them ever voting Tory again - they despised 'spivs' like Nigel Farage and everything he stood for.

In your Daily Mail infested brain, maybe. Thankfully, the future will belong to the young, and I'm 62 !

Also - like the "old people without degrees all voted for Brexit", these claims are based on a statistical extrapolation, often from a very small sample size and are also based entirely on what people who were asked told the researchers. This "data" is from the very same polling organisations that failed to predict the outcome of the referendum, yet somehow some people have accepted their guesses as immutable truths and "facts

So around 95% of old people as very few people went to university in the 80’s.
It didn’t mean you were thick or destined to be in a low paying job, it was because most jobs didn’t require A levels and a degree.
Even becoming a chartered accountant you could start at 16 with O levels

What do you mean by level of inequality.

As a parent my dc are doing better than me as they have more access to information and more able to work the hours they choose.

I grew up in poverty. What classes as poverty now sounds like luxury in comparison.

@Kennykenkencat the kind of equality where the income multiple in a company between the lowest and highest paid used to be a factor of 8 and is now a factor of 100s. That differential needs to be much, much smaller.

Modern medicine is completely different to yesteryear, she knew her limits and went into the care for the elderly and did very well

But peoples bodies haven’t changed.

Friend was made redundant from NHS. Not because de couldn’t cope. She was teaching the new stuff to the graduates. She was made redundant because she didn’t have a degree.

She was in charge of 3 wards of geriatric patients who for the most part needed a lot of comforting and stuff that having a degree didn’t teach you.

JudgeRinderonTinder
But with regards to Brexit voting, of those surveyed over 70% had no education past GCSE if I remember correctly

I think you have misunderstood the claim - which was this;
70% of voters with only GCSE qualifications or lower voted to leave

What was the educational attainment of the 28% who didn't bother to vote in the referendum at all? Unless they are all highly educated, one must assume that the leave vote would have been considerably higher if compulsory voting had been introduced.

It’s not even a well founded guess. It is increasingly difficult to recruit a proper balanced sample for ‘research’ of any sort. A very large number of people are too busy, too uninterested , or just over researched to participate, so what you tend to end up with is a sample of people with an axe to grind, or people who have nothing better to do . The numbers are ‘adjusted ‘ by ‘ weighting’ - but if you don’t have a robust sample in the first place, how do you know how to weight?

This trend was very noticeable when I last commissioned research years ago, I can’t see any reason why it would have changed. The last few election results and the opinion polls leading up to them would seem to indicate that my view is not unduly cynical. Of course , it is a well kept secret in the research industry

I think this is particularly the case with political polling. The secret ballot is a privilege which people in Britain have died to obtain and protect. The exit poll is an abomination. - and it’s not even accurate, for the reasons outlined above.

I agree with the OP. I am thirty and all my friends and colleagues of a similar age vote Tory (including me).