Political Elites Are More Supportive of Progressive Policies Than the Average Voter
By Alexander C. Furnas, Ph.D. and Timothy M. LaPira, Ph.D.
Progressives often argue Democratic insiders are too moderate or conservative, and that the personal political preferences of these elite actors prevents the party from embracing a transformative progressive change. However, our new analysis suggests that political elites are more supportive of a wide array of progressive policies than the average likely voter.
Last winter we surveyed over 3,500 political elites and public servants, asking them their views on a set of 10 policy proposals. For the purposes of this survey, we defined political elites as those who hold significant authoritative roles in government, or those outside government whose occupations position them to influence those inside government as a significant part of their job. This elite population includes thousands of unelected bureaucrats, judges, media pundits, campaign consultants, lobbyists, think tankers, commissioned military officers, lawyers, scientists, and business and nongovernmental organization leaders. These political elites are important to democratic responsiveness in their own right because they influence the policy agenda, craft and implement policy, and frame the rhetoric that reelection-motivated politicians use to justify the policy positions they take. At the same time, we asked a sample of likely voters their views on these same issues. This provides us a unique opportunity to directly compare the policy preferences of these two populations on a variety of policy issues.
We asked all respondents their opinions on the following 10 policy issues:
Placing a tax on carbon emissions.
Ensuring 40 percent of all new clean energy infrastructure development spending goes to low-income communities.
Federal investments to ensure a carbon-pollution-free electricity sector by 2035.
A ‘Medicare for All’ system in which all Americans would get healthcare from a government-run plan.
A ‘public option,’ which would allow Americans to buy into a government-run healthcare plan if they choose to do so.
Immigration reforms that would provide a path to U.S. citizenship for undocumented immigrants currently in the United States.
A law that requires companies to provide paid family leave for parents.
A 2 percent tax on the assets of individuals with a net worth of more than $50 million.
Increasing deportations for those in the US illegally.
Offering seniors healthcare vouchers to purchase private healthcare plans in place of traditional Medicare coverage.
This set of policy proposals includes eight progressive proposals and two conservative proposals. The two conservative proposals are “increasing deportations for those in the US illegally” and “healthcare vouchers for seniors.”
Large majorities of Democrats support all eight progressive policies; however, we find a consistently higher rate of support among the Democratic elite than the Democratic likely voters. On climate issues, more than 95 percent of Democratic elites support a carbon tax and federal investments to ensure a carbon free energy sector by 2035, compared to between 75 and 78 percent of likely Democratic voters, respectively. We see a smaller difference between the Democratic elite and Democratic voter preferences on ensuring that a share of clean energy investment goes to low-income communities, with 89 percent of elites and 77 percent Democratic voters supporting. We see much lower levels of Democratic support on the two conservative policies we tested, with the lowest level of support among elite respondents.
In general, we see larger shares of Independent political elites supporting progressive policies than Independent likely voters. The differences are especially stark on immigration issues, with 91 percent of Independent elites supporting a pathway to citizenship, compared to only 64 percent of Independent likely voters. Furthermore, 62 percent of Independent likely voters support increasing deportations, compared to only 34 percent of Independent elites. We see close correspondence between the share of Independent elites and voters on paid family leave, healthcare vouchers for seniors, and a 2 percent wealth tax.
While Republican respondents are unsurprisingly much less likely to support progressive policies than either Independent or Democratic respondents, we do see some interesting differences between elites and likely voters. Republican elites are more likely than Republican likely voters to favor progressive policies on immigration and climate issues, but less likely to favor progressive healthcare policies. Interestingly, more than 55 percent of Republican likely voters favor a wealth tax, compared to just over 25 percent of Republican political elites.
We also asked respondents a set of five normative questions that allows us to estimate their ideology from left (liberal) to right (conservative). We find that political elites tend to be more ideologically extreme on average than their co-partisan counterparts among likely voters.
The figure above shows the distribution of ideology of both political elites and likely voters by party. Among Democrats we observe a larger proportion of political elites further to the left of center than among the likely voters. Similarly, Republican political elites are on average further to the right than Republican likely voters. The distribution of Democratic political elites, however, is significantly more spread out than the distribution of Republican elites, indicative of the “big tent” nature of Democratic politics, compared with the higher degree of ideological cohesion among Republican elites.
Ultimately it is clear that political elites’ policy preferences are, in fact, distinct from those of their copartisan likely voters. While majorities of both Democratic elites and likely voters favor the progressive policies we tested, the elites are more unified in their support of these policies across the board, and elites tend to be further to the left on our measure of ideology. The picture among Republicans is a bit more nuanced; on issues of healthcare and taxes, Republican elites are consistently more conservative than likely voters, but on climate and immigration Republican elites are more divided than their likely voter counterparts.
These results are particularly meaningful in the context of recent discussions about the influence of elite actors on the future direction of the Democratic Party. We find that Democratic elites are neither out-of-touch leftists — they have the backing of the overwhelming majority of their co-partisan voters on 9 out of 10 issues we polled — nor are they milquetoast centrists afraid to take progressive policy positions. They tend to be slightly more ideologically extreme than likely voters, but are a relatively heterogeneous group. Despite this ideological diversity, they are consistent supporters of progressive policies with widespread Democratic support.
Alexander C. Furnas, Ph.D. (Zander; @zfurnas), is a Research Assistant Professor at the Center for Science of Science and Innovation at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University.
Tim LaPira, Ph.D. (@timlapira), is professor of political science at James Madison University and faculty affiliate of the Center for Effective Lawmaking at University of Virginia and Vanderbilt University.