Interview with Ruy Teixeira on "Demographic Change and the Future of the Parties"

by DemFromCT
from DailyKos
Sun Jun 27, 2010 at 06:00:03 AM PDT

Ruy Teixeira is a demographics expert who is the co-author with John Judis of The Emerging Democratic Majority (2002.) He's currently a Senior Fellow at both The Century Foundation and Center for American Progress and has recently published a working paper entitled Demographic Change and the Future of the Parties (.pdf, 45 pages), reviewed here by Tom Schaller for FiveThirtyEight.com and Ed Kilgore at the Democratic Strategist. Ruy's work was featured yesterday in a NY Times column by Charles Blow.

From his CAP page:

Teixeira's recent writings include "Demographic Change and the Future of the Parties," "The European Paradox" (with Matt Browne and John Halpin), "New Progressive America," "New Progressive America: The Millennial Generation" (with David Madland), and "The Decline of the White Working Class and the Rise of a Mass Upper Middle Class" (with Alan Abramowitz).

Ruy has kindly agreed to answer a few question for us pertaining to the working paper and some selected contemporary political issues.

Daily Kos: You’ve been following demographic trends for years. In your working paper, you note that the working class white vote, which is often conservative-oriented, is declining and by remarkable percentages (25% in PA over twenty years, 24% in NV), suggesting major repercussions for conservative politics. Are those trends everywhere? Are places like the South, Ohio, or West Virginia or other places seen as "Hillary" strongholds in 2008 subject to the same trends?

(Continued here.)