patrick.net

To correct some of Brand's misinformation:

http://pewresearch.org/pubs/27/politics-and-the-dotnet-generation

Voter turnout has pretty much had a constant trend of about 20% less for under 30 year olds since the 70s, which were supposidly the politically active boomers. I'm gen X dead center and could only legally vote since about 1990 to put a time marker in the data.

The difference between generation participation is basically insignificant throughout the decades with only the 90s having any noticeable drop. I guess gen X has learned to be more involved since the numbers went back up since.

The middle chart has some even more telling stats for the modern day breakdowns of social participation.

While boomers always vote 53% of the time verses gen Xs 34%, WWII gen always votes 72% showing a consistent 20% difference as you move down the age brackets until you get to gen Y, roughly 10% less than X.

As you look further down the charts the other statistics are even more interesting. Basically one can conclude from the data that voting participation has remained somewhat stable throughout the decades, but for other measures of social activities comparing Boomers to the younger generations, the activities have almost no significant difference in present day. Literally single digits represent the differences. If you factor just the available time and wealth, one can argue gen X and Y are likely to be as active or even more active in social activities than their boomer parents are now or were when they were similar ages.

Malcolm: What you're stating is a truism. People tend to vote more as they get older. Right now the boomers are getting older, the "WWII generation" is dying out, and Generation X is (theoretically) coming into its own. I fail to see where I stated any misinformation.

I maintain that if something were systemically wrong for Generation X/Y, they would be attacking the polls en masse, creating a statistical anomaly. If anything, your graph supports my point. Everything is approximately the status quo, with no temporary or permanent deviations from mean.

Perhaps in a separate post we should discuss how absolutely pathetic the median has truly become (or has always been). If 2/3 of any eligible generation doesn't vote, how fair can any democracy truly be? Fairness in that case can only be determined by participation, not by argument.

First, to be clear, I do not think you are intentionally trying to mislead anyone. I just believe your conclusion is in error.

The chart clearly supports my point in that in 2004 the same percentage of under 30s voted as in 1976. As to you point about people tending to vote more as people get older as the norm, that is my point as well. It evidently is not that a particular generation is more active than another. Ironically you're saying I'm wrong and then mirroring my conclusion.

Then, respectfully, your conclusion about attacking the polls in higher numbers if there were something systemically wrong falls short. Your generation had way more social upheavals than mine did yet the voting levels for the under 30, as mentioned, is exactly the same as some 30 years prior. In order for your logic to work you would have to conclude that boomers were satisfied with the status quo and so gen X/Ys are just as happy with the system since the voting rate is 'currently' the same as it was. By definition boomers were not satisfied with the status quo hence the proudly worn lable of the 'counter culture.'

label ~sp

There are still bursts of good stuff, but it’s often drowned out by misogynistic and/or racist crap. I miss the “good old days.”

Yeah, I stopped posting and reading about that time, too. I was accused of being "bitter" the last time I posted: the only thing I have to be bitter about is the decline in this blogs quality, which for a while, was one of the best on the Net.

DinOR,. I passed your message on to astrid, she will reply if she feels like it. I still owe her some photos of the tomatoes I grew from the seeds she sent me.

The Chronicle today reports that Bay Area rents are up 9.4% in the area and up 14.5% in San Francisco since the end of 2006.

http://preview.tinyurl.com/3ygeju

They might be falling in some areas, but they aren't falling here. Noe Valley rent growth as been strong, too, as far as I can tell:

http://www.noevalleyvoice.com/2007/December-January/Cost.html

If 2/3 of any eligible generation doesn’t vote, how fair can any democracy truly be?
Well those 2/3 people DID express their opinion: "we don't care much who wins".

I was one of the first sub-age-21 voters after the ratification of the XXVI Amendment back in 1971, and in fact ran the UC Santa Cruz students for Dick Nixon in 1972 - a thankless job if there ever was one.

The student radical types were much too busy complaining and stirring up trouble to take the time to register and then vote. How else do you explain Nixon getting 60% of the popular vote in 1972?

It's often said that Americans don't vote in the percentages of people in other countries. I suspect this is do to voter fatigue. In California people are confronted with thick books of ballot propositions and have to vote for huge numbers of positions.

I'm writing a book and therefore am doing research on politics in the UK. In the UK, the average voter only gets to vote for two guys: his member of parliament and his local town/city counselors (what we would call supervisors). Even his local MAYOR is appointed by the central government. The average UK voter would be astonished if presented with a US-style sample ballot with everything from the school board on up as a directly-elected position.

replace "do" with "due"

Here's a news link from the town of Star (a 1-horse town west of Boise).

http://www.idahostatesman.com/eyepiece/story/270258.html

The SF Chronicle is now starting to put out those, "what to do when your house sits on the market" articles targeted to stubborn sellers:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/01/20/REDOUF7J4.DTL

Maybe the REIC-MSM "team" is finally starting to systematically target sellers in order to juice up sales...

Skibum,

That article states in regards DOM "for the Bay Areas it's hovering at 48 days as of November 2007, the most recent data from the California Association of Realtors." I wonder whether that includes only REAL SALES or just dropping/relisting etc. 48 DOM for sales sounds pretty good all things considered.

It ignores re-listings. Clearly. I'm not sure there's a clear way to track re-listings. Zip did it for a while, but that quit working well some time back. Zillow allowed you to deduce it before they sold out to the REIC.

I believe there's still something to creating a persistent, MLS tracking database that keys off of external identifiers not within the realtor's grasp.

I know someone who manually tracks mls listings in excel for his target area. Nothing gets by this way, relistings, expired never sell, short pay, forclosure sell - if it pops up in mls you track it.

If you are serious about buying, your area would be very small and the number of 'real' new listings poping up isnt that large - very easy to to see the homes relisting 5 times, dissapear a while, and come back. But if you only check the mls every now and then you will miss this. Also you will see foreclosures disspear before the trustee sale - then MAYBE reapper as reo in a few months (somes pocket foreclosure listing sells outside mls, sometimes the bank is happy to let REO rot away vacant).

Dennis (and Randy),

Yeah, relistings are a huge problem skewing DOM. It's hard for me to be able to estimate how much effect it has on the stats, but my guess is quite significant.

MLS being a "local" monopoly on information, in other parts of the country, listings can't be re-listed and called a "new" listing unless it stayed off the market (off MLS at least) for at least 30 days.

Tracking your search target area yourself is something most everyone does. But you don't come close to capturing *everything* that way. I've been following Mill Valley/Corte Madera and surrounds for almost 3 years now. And I'm very serious about buying, despite the fact realtors love to say "you're not serious about buying" whenever someone balks at bubble prices. I love that, by the way. Sort of like "bawk bawk bawk, whaddya chicken??" Sure, I'll forfeit my family's future because some realtor taunted me.

Anyway, most people search actively for a couple, few months, then take a short break, then re-engage. During those gyrations, lots of MLS shenanigans slip through your personal "Excel" filter. And, even if you managed to capture every single listing you only have data relevant to the day you start, not historically useful data so you can spy trends and regressions.