From The Guardian
Millennials are not behaving as expected. But what else is new? This time it’s their voting patterns and it spells very bad news for the Coalition [The right-wing coalition of the "Liberal" and the National/Country Party].
In Australia, the previous three generations – the silent generation, the baby boomers and generation X – all voted left when they were young, on average. Now the silent generation and the boomers, on average, vote right and gen X voting habits don’t appear to have changed much over their lifetime.
As they age, however, millennials appear to be going in entirely the opposite direction. Moving more to the left.
The trend where previous generations have moved right as they age, while millennials have moved left, is being seen across the English-speaking world. This is a big problem for the parties of the right as millennials make up an increasingly larger proportion of voters and it had an impact on the last federal election.
According to data from the Australian Electoral Commission there are now four electorates where those under 40 make up more than 45% of the voters in the seat: Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Griffith. Griffith is an inner-city seat in Brisbane. Both Brisbane and Griffith switched to the Greens, which means the Greens now hold three of the top four.
The Coalition lost 18 seats and government, with almost all the lost seats in the major cities. The one bright spot for the Coalition was that they lost no rural seats. Rural seats are older. The 10 electorates with the smallest proportion of people under 40 are all rural seats (with the National party holding five of them). These are the seats that will see the slowest impact from millennials.
But even here the demographics are against the Coalition. Cities are growing rapidly, which means the proportion of city electorates is increasing, while rural seats are dwindling.
As older generations die out, millennials will increasingly come to dominate a larger number of electorates. If they continue to vote left, this will be catastrophic for the Coalition.
But why are millennials continuing to vote left as they age? There are probably three main reasons, and they are all linked to their economic wellbeing.
Insecure work
The first is the rise of insecure work. Whether it’s casual jobs, sham contracting, or labour hire, the number of insecure jobs is rising and younger workers are those most impacted. Millennials took the advice of their parents. They studied hard, with record numbers of them getting university degrees. But the secure well-paid jobs that were promised for those who worked hard have not appeared. In 2021 one in four unemployed people had a university degree.
While unemployment might be at historic lows, if the jobs are not secure then people are not able to plan a future. Wages growth has also been almost non-existent for a decade. Real wages, your wages after adjusting for increasing prices, have gone backwards over the last 11 years.
The economic deal of secure, stable and well-paid employment that was offered to previous generations has not been offered to millennials.
The Coalition is openly hostile to any changes in industrial relations laws that would make work more secure and give more bargaining power to workers. It was completely opposed to the recent modest changes to IR laws put forward by the Labor party. Further changes to try to reduce insecure work are expected to be brought forward this year. Millennials will likely be the biggest winners from these changes.Housing affordability
The second reason is housing. Housing gives families stability and security. Robert Menzies, Australia’s longest-serving prime minister and the founder of the Liberal party, understood this. His government had a specific policy of increasing home ownership rates. Menzies believed that people were more likely to settle down and support their community if they owned a part of it.
Modern Liberals have a completely different view of housing. They see it as an investment, a way for people to make money. They have opposed policies that would make housing more affordable. Policies like scrapping tax concessions to property investors or large expansions to public housing.
Perhaps the Coalition hopes that as the boomers die off, they will pass down their expanded property portfolios to millennials, giving them economic security and hopefully switching them to vote conservative. But with average life expectancy now in the 80s and continuing to rise, many millennials will be into their 60s or older before they inherit.
Climate change
For previous generations, the existential threat was from nuclear annihilation and the cold war. The Coalition was successful in convincing many people that it was the party best placed to provide protection from this.
Today’s existential threat is from climate change and the Coalition is either ambivalent or in some cases openly hostile to action to prevent it. The impacts of climate change are now clear, and they are only going to get worse. Younger people will disproportionately bear the costs of inaction on climate change, so it is not hard to see why they are reluctant to vote for parties that are unwilling to act.
These three issues – insecure work, housing affordability and climate change – mean that millennials are sharing in less of the benefits of the economy and are less secure than previous generations.
The Coalition doesn’t have to do anything about this. But parties that ignore the concerns of important cohorts of voters are usually rewarded with extended time in opposition.
Climate change
For previous generations, the existential threat was from nuclear annihilation and the cold war. The Coalition was successful in convincing many people that it was the party best placed to provide protection from this.
Today’s existential threat is from climate change and the Coalition is either ambivalent or in some cases openly hostile to action to prevent it. The impacts of climate change are now clear, and they are only going to get worse. Younger people will disproportionately bear the costs of inaction on climate change, so it is not hard to see why they are reluctant to vote for parties that are unwilling to act.
These three issues – insecure work, housing affordability and climate change – mean that millennials are sharing in less of the benefits of the economy and are less secure than previous generations.
The Coalition doesn’t have to do anything about this. But parties that ignore the concerns of important cohorts of voters are usually rewarded with extended time in opposition.
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