Democrats party of rich, study finds By Donald Lambro November 23, 2007 Democrats like to define themselves as the party of poor and middle- income Americans, but a new study says they now represent the majority of the nation's wealthiest congressional districts.
In a state-by-state, district-by-district comparison of wealth concentrations based on Internal Revenue Service income data, Michael Franc, vice president of government relations at the Heritage Foundation, found that the majority of the nation's wealthiest congressional jurisdictions were represented by Democrats. He also found that more than half of the wealthiest households were concentrated in the 18 states where Democrats hold both Senate seats. "If you take the wealthiest one-third of the 435 congressional districts, we found that the Democrats represent about 58 percent of those jurisdictions," Mr. Franc said. A key measure of each district's wealth was the number of single- filer taxpayers earning more than $100,000 a year and married couples filing jointly who earn more than $200,000 annually, he said. But in a broader measurement, the study also showed that of the 167 House districts where the median annual income was higher than the national median of $48,201, a slight majority, 84 districts, were represented by Democrats. Median means that half of all income earners make more than that level and half make less. Mr. Franc's study also showed that contrary to the Democrats' tendency to define Republicans as the party of the rich, "the vast majority of unabashed conservative House members hail from profoundly middle-income districts." "I just found the pattern across the board to be very interesting. That pattern shows the likelihood of electing a Democrat to the House is very closely correlated with how many wealthy households are in that district," Mr. Franc said in an interview with The Washington Times. Page 1 of 2 next |Email | Print | Subscribe
