Young voters aged 20 to 36 are a different demographic from the rest of the American voting base.
According to a recent Gallup poll, 59 percent of American millennial voters think a good candidate is running this year. According to the poll, 55 percent of all millennials still support presidential candidate Bernie Sanders.
Thirty-eight percent of respondents supported opposing Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, while 22 percent said they supported presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump. Sixty percent said candidates are talking about the issues they care about.
However, millennial voters are also significantly less likely to follow election news. Twenty-one percent of respondents said they follow news “very closely,” compared to 35 percent of generation X voters, 48 percent of baby boomers, and older voters.
Younger voters are also less likely to think the election process is working.
Gallup’s analysis of this poll said the consequences of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Great Recession and the collapse of the housing bubble in 2008 have made millennials support drastic changes to fix the issues they care about. They also said Sanders’ policies are the closest to what they think these changes should be, despite how unlikely he is to receive the Democratic nomination in July.
Gallup also recently did extensive polling on millennials’ beliefs regarding work and the economy.
Workplace policy changes they would like to see, according to recent polling, include relaxed, more personable relationships between employee and employers, time or programs that help enhance well-being of employees and meaningful jobs. They support policies that help employees get more out of their work than paychecks, switching jobs more often than any other generation has before.
Emily Ernsberger
