The Washington Post on Friday released a rebuttal to the narrative that President Donald Trump beat his opponent Hillary Clinton because of low-income voters.
"Trump did better in poorer areas even as Clinton did better with poorer voters," the Post's Philip Bump wrote.
According to exit polling data compiled by Edison Media Research, nearly 7 out of 10 Trump voters earned more than $50,000 per year, while only about 6 out of 10 Clinton voters are in the same income group.
This fact is obscured by the average median household income of counties that Trump won, which was around $47,200, compared to counties Clinton won, which had an average median income of $51,600.
"Looking at the results of counties may make Trump feel better about 2016, but it's deceptive given the uneven population distribution in counties," Bump notes.
"So we took the voting results in every county and grouped them by median household income, rounded to the nearest $5,000. More of Trump's support came from poorer counties. In fact, voters in counties with a median annual income of more than $50,000 made up more than 64 percent of Clinton's support — but only 54 percent of Trump's. Forty-six percent of his support came from voters in poorer counties."
Although the reason why Trump voters tend to have higher incomes when most of them come from low-income areas, "one possibility is much of Trump's support in lower-income areas came from higher-income voters. (Higher-income voters are generally more likely to vote in part because they move less frequently, making it easier to maintain registration and know where to vote.)"
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