The days of wearing an Obama t-shirt to a frat party might be over. According to The Atlantic, people age 19-29 are supporting Obama less than they were in 2008. Now only 56-percent of this voter group says they support President Obama, a drop of 10-percent. Informal surveys point the same direction, even more dramatically. The Daily Caller reports that only 27-percent of likely voters ages 18-28 say they are committed to vote for Obama again, down from the 83-percent that say they did vote for him.
Why the shift? Obama wants to tax and spend, leaving this young generation to pick up the slack. This is certainly a plausible answer. Let’s take a look at some of the ways in which Obama is hurting these young people.
DEBT: Obama has asked for a clean debt increase, meaning that the U.S. would continue to spend by borrowing the money. He doesn’t want to cut spending and doesn’t even seem willing to compromise. Borrowing these large amounts of money will only place harder and more severe debts on these people under 30. It is them, not the current maturing generation that make up most of the legislature and Obama’s administration, who will foot the bill.
TAXES: Obama, through an increase in government spending and because of a belief in redistribution of wealth has sought to raise taxes. He swears that he will not raise any form of taxes on those making less than $250,000 a year. Even if we assume that this statement is true (though it definitely isn’t), we must conclude that he is willing to raise taxes on the “wealthy.” But these are the people hiring. If business and personal taxes go up for the biggest earners, they will have less money to hire employees. This will decimate the job market for the younger generation even more than it will hurt the wealthy and middle class. These are the people seeking the minimum wage and starter jobs which will be most likely to be cut first. Already, the job market for under 30 year olds looks bleak, how much more can they take?
MEDISCARE: The recent strategy for Democrats, including many in Obama’s administration, is to paint Republicans as trying to destroy Medicare. They argue that because Paul Ryan’s plan would put some of the funds into private accounts, that it will rob seniors of their money and needed support (of course this is also false). But most people in this younger age bracket would love reform. Most of them do not believe that the benefits of Social Security or Medicare will be viable for them anyway. They are willing to try anything to put the authority and responsibility for their futures back into their own hands. Michele Bachmann is even advocating that the Ryan Plan be renamed the ‘Under 55 Plan.’ They are willing and ready for real change.
These are just a few of the reasons why this younger generation may be turning on Obama. They were promised hope and change and received dreary and worse. Obama is losing support and some of this is because he has taxed and spent through his young voter political capital.