If the gop win the midterms

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by PaulS

Quick search


Over three-quarters of US charities’ revenues come from donations by individuals, and we used these individual giving decisions to learn about differences in “apolitical” behaviour by partisans. In three surveys, we asked whether Republicans and conservatives give more or less to charity than Democrats and liberals. While political identity and giving are measured slightly differently across the surveys, the results are consistent: Republicans and conservatives report donating between $60 and $160 more per year to charity than Democrats and liberals. This result holds even when we account for socio-economic measures that are correlated both with political identity and charitable giving. The baseline difference in giving behaviour comports with what others have found: partisanship is a dividing line not only in terms of choosing candidates and policies, but also in how partisans spend their disposable income.

Having established the difference, we next wanted to know why a partisan gap in giving appears. We tested three potential explanations – religious identity, political beliefs, and economic status.

We found the strongest support for the religious explanation. Republicans are not only more likely to attend church than Democrats, but church attendance – among Democrats and Republicans alike – is strongly associated with charitable giving. Gaps in giving, therefore, are linked to differences in the social composition of the parties, in which the average Republican is more religious than the average Democrat. Moreover, the overall giving gap emerges because Republicans donate more to their own religious congregations, rather than nationally active religious charities. Republicans and Democrats give roughly equal amounts to religious organisations aside from their own congregations, and we also find some evidence that Democrats donate more to non-religious organisations than Republicans. In other words, the baseline difference in charitable giving emerges because Republicans are more religious than Democrats, and religious people donate generously to their religious congregations.

We find no support for the claim that political beliefs drive differences in giving. It is possible that Republicans donate more to charity due to their ideological beliefs – indeed, conservative politicians in the US often claim that the government should get out of the way and let the charitable sector provide services. Republicans on our surveys might signal their opposition to income redistribution and support for private service provision by donating to charitable causes, substituting donation behaviour for support for government redistribution. Borrowing from Ellis and Stimson’s distinction between symbolic conservatives – those who merely call themselves conservative, but do not oppose government redistribution – and operational conservatives – those who hold conservative beliefs about the role of government – we find no evidence that political beliefs explain why Republicans donate more than Democrats. Republicans who are strong operational conservatives, and therefore oppose government redistribution the most, do not give any more or less to charity than Republicans who support government redistribution. Thus, Republicans do not donate more to express their preference for private service provision over large government social service programmes.

Third, we tested whether Republicans donate more than Democrats due to a differing desire to signal high economic status, which is one of the explanations for the differences in baby names cited above. But we find little evidence that changing economic evaluations cause changes in levels of anticipated giving in the short term. Using the 2012 presidential election as a natural experiment, we show that Republicans’ perceptions of their economic status, as well as their reported spending on vacations, declined following the re-election of Democrat Barack Obama. However, giving behaviour was unaffected by the election, reinforcing our conclusion that differences in giving come from differences in religiosity, not politics or economics.

Our findings have important implications for how we think about politics and charitable giving. It is a fact that there are differences in giving patterns between Democrats and Republicans. However, these differences stem from underlying differences in the social compositions of the parties, rather than from differences in ideological beliefs or a desire to signal status. In particular, the partisan gap appears because of a difference in a very specific type of giving, donating to one’s own congregation or house of worship. We find no conservative advantage when it comes to non-religious charities, or even religious charities beyond one’s own congregation. The large religiosity gap that exists in American politics today, coupled with the tendency of religious Americans to donate to their own churches, helps explain the overall partisan difference in charitable giving. To the extent that Republicans and Democrats are culturally divided, these divisions appear to have little, if anything to do with disagreements about public policy.

Paul, YOU are the one saying that republicans care less about the poor. There's no evidence that's true, other than your desperate wish for it to be true. The study I posted shows the 2 sides give about the same, so no big difference.

"Conserv. always look down at the poor"

Then please explain the stance taken by each side, regarding school choice. I'll wait.

"Tell me where I ever said that.
Your (for Scott) a liar."

You're claiming , that you have never dismissed the results of the "Who Really Cares" study, on the basis that the difference is largely due to giving to churches. You've never once said that? Is that what you're saying I made up? Because every single time I bring up that study, you say something like "that's only because republicans give more to their church..."

I can't read that yellow font., sorry...

[PaulS]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

Paul, YOU are the one saying that republicans care less about the poor.and it is reflected in their being more concerned w/low taxes There's no evidence that's true, other than your desperate wish for it to be true. The study I posted shows the 2 sides give about the same, so no big difference.But yet you are the one always saying that cons. give more to charity than liberals! I don't bring up charity - you do!!!

"Conserv. always look down at the poor"

Then please explain the stance taken by each side, regarding school choice. I'll wait.Liberals want to make the public schools stronger. Cons. want the ability to go to private schools and want the cities to subsidize their tuition.

"Tell me where I ever said that.
Your (for Scott) a liar."

You're claiming , that you have never dismissed the results of the "Who Really Cares" study, on the basis that the difference is largely due to giving to churches. You've never once said that? Is that what you're saying I made up? Because every single time I bring up that study, you say something like "that's only because republicans give more to their church..."

You said "since you like to dismiss that because you don't think donating to churches qualifies as charity" I have never said it doesn't count as charity - just that the difference between lib/cons. giving is that cons. give to their church. Some of the studies I posted show that. One thing I learned is that the giving is not to the national church but to the local congregation.

I can't read that yellow font., sorry...

Run your curser over the text. I shouldn't have used yellow

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by PaulS

Run your curser over the text. I shouldn't have used yellow

ok, you say liberals want to deny school choice, and instead make public schools stronger?

the inner city public schools will take a long time to be made stronger, so why not offer choice until those schools are made stronger?

Obvious answer, liberals want to protect their union benefactors, even at the expense of the educational future of those kids. Thats irrefutable.

The poor people in those cities desperately want school choice paul. when school choice is offered, do you think no parents jump at the chance, or do you think demand is high? If you care about poor people, why not let the ones who are currently stuck in crappy schools, choose an alternative that is better for their children? you think it’s better to tell them “don’t worry, some day this school will be better”? That’s better for poor people?

And those schools can’t be made stronger by liberals, because liberals equate “stronger” with more funding. Urban schools
don’t stink because of a lack of spending. We spend a fortune on urban schools in CT. They stink because of the erosion of the family in urban areas, and that’s not a problem that can be fixed by throwing money at it. I wish it were that simple. But it’s not.
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

[PaulS]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

ok, you say liberals want to deny school choice, and instead make public schools stronger?

the inner city public schools will take a long time to be made stronger, so why not offer choice until those schools are made stronger?

Obvious answer, liberals want to protect their union benefactors, even at the expense of the educational future of those kids. Thats irrefutable. What is irrefutable is that you want me to help subsidize your kids going to private school.

The poor people in those cities desperately want school choice paul. when school choice is offered, do you think no parents jump at the chance, or do you think demand is high? If you care about poor people, why not let the ones who are currently stuck in crappy schools, choose an alternative that is better for their children? you think it’s better to tell them “don’t worry, some day this school will be better”? That’s better for poor people?

And those schools can’t be made stronger by liberals, because liberals equate “stronger” with more funding. Urban schools
don’t stink because of a lack of spending. We spend a fortune on urban schools in CT. They stink because of the erosion of the family in urban areas, and that’s not a problem that can be fixed by throwing money at it. I wish it were that simple. But it’s not.
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

As soon as you subsidize my ability to join a private country club instead of the local town owned course I might change my mind.

[scottw]

Originally Posted by PaulS

As soon as you subsidize my ability to join a private country club instead of the local town owned course I might change my mind.

really?

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by PaulS

As soon as you subsidize my ability to join a private country club instead of the local town owned course I might change my mind.

"What is irrefutable is that you want me to help subsidize your kids going to private school."

ONE HUNDRED percent false. That is literally 100% demonstrable bullsh*t. In my case, I'd like to direct some of MY TAX DOLLARS, to the school of my choice. How is that asking you to subsidize me by even one cent?

In the case of poor people stuck in the cities, now the truth comes out, you accidentally said the quiet part out loud. You claim all day long you want to help these people, and they are begging for more school choice, which you'd deny them, because YOU don't like the idea of any of your money going to a private school. You're OK with your tax dollars subsidizing their crappy (and more expensive)public schools. But you're not OK with your tax dollars subsidizing them to attend quality private schools (often cheaper) that actually work. Please, please tell us how that's helping poor people?

Paul, you'd rather subsidize them to attend lousy schools in Hartford which costs $20k per year per kid, than send them to my kids' tiny Catholic school which has less than 10 kids per class, and costs $5500 per kid for middle school grades? That';s just chock full of common sense.

That's liberalism, boy! "I demand to spend $20k per year of public money on a terrible school, rather than $5500 per year on a terrific school!!"

It's stupid, and it does nothing to help poor people. But more money goes to the unions, which means more money goes to helping democrats win elections. And THAT'S what matters.

You want to fix public schools? Offer school choice. Tell public schools that they now have competition. Do that, and those public schools would make some meaningful improvements in the next 5 seconds (they can't fix the effect of broken families, but they can fix some things, like get rid of lousy teachers). There's zero incentive to do a good job, when you have a perfect monopoly.

You say to poor people "keep voting democrat, and hopefully one day before your kids graduate (or drop out), those schools will improve".

You're telling poor people to suck it up. I'd offer them a huge improvement. Yet you're on the side of the angels. Sure Paul, whatever you say. Nothing but hollow, empty, virtue-signaling rhetoric.

Your country club example is way off, because catholic schools are usually cheaper than the public schools in the cities.

So would you turn down the chance to play at a private country club which had a better course and lower greens fees than your public golf course? Because that's what you're advocating for here. You're advocating to spend a fortune more money, for a vastly inferior product. That just makes all kinds of sense.

[scottw]

he compared an underprivileged kid in a failing school getting the opportunity to get a good education that might lift them out of poverty,,,, to him getting a free membership at a private golf course....

good grief....

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by scottw

he compared an underprivileged kid in a failing school getting the opportunity to get a good education that might lift them out of poverty,,,, to him getting a free membership at a private golf course....

good grief....

Yup. But he's the virtuous one. You cannot make that up.

Every once in awhile Scott, they say the quiet part out loud. They want huge numbers of poor people to stay exactly where they are, because the more of them that are in the cities and addicted to welfare, the larger their reliable voting block is.

Choice a - spend $20k per year per student in Hartford public schools, which are failing sh*tholes.

Choice b - spend less than $6k per year to send them to a catholic K-8 school with less than 10 kids per class, and where kids on average perform a full grade level higher than where they are, on standardized tests.

Why is this a difficult choice? Politics. That's it. If you were at all motivated by an actual urge to help these people, that's a ridiculously easy decision.

But unfortunately for those poor people, while school choice will help lift those kids out of poverty, it doesn't help democrats win elections.

The poor people need to form a union. Then the democrats will actually act on their behalf.
The other benefit to this school choice...let's say you pull 10 kids out of Hartford (where you'd spend $20k per kid), and out them in my kids school, which costs $5500 per kid...the public school in Hartford (1) now has fewer kids, thus smaller class sizes, which everyone knows helps kids. And (2) they also have more money, because Hartford schools can keep the $14,500 they were going to spend anyway on each kid who left for private school. If it's 10 kids who leave, thats $145k that Hartford can spend on the remaining kids.

In other words, after those kids leave, the public school can now spend even more money per kid, on the kids who choose to remain there.

Win-win.

[PaulS]

Originally Posted by scottw

he compared an underprivileged kid in a failing school getting the opportunity to get a good education that might lift them out of poverty,,,, to him getting a free membership at a private golf course....

good grief....

subsidized snarky one, not free