How 'All in the Family' Explains Biden's Strength Among Seniors

It's usually a given that Republicans will win over voters 65 and older, but that's not the case in this election. Instead, polls show President Biden close or even ahead among seniors, continuing a steady (and largely ignored) trend of Democratic gains among older voters.

Mr. Biden's strength among seniors may be surprising, but the most likely explanation is deceptively simple: At all earlier stages of their lives, many of today's seniors voted Democrat. They just got big.

Archie arguing with his son-in-law, Michael, whom he called a “meathead”. Maybe he's saying something we can't print.

CBS, via Getty Images

Archie's generation was the only one to react to Barack Obama's nomination in 2008 by changing right: A higher proportion of them voted for John McCain in 2008 than for George W. Bush in 2004.

But in 2024, Archie shouldn't be your picture of the elderly. Archie would have turned 100 today; their generation, called the greatest generation, is almost entirely dead. The generation that came after Archie's, the conservative Silent Generation, which grew up during Eisenhower's popular “Leave It to Beaver” 1950s presidency, is also mostly dead. Only 20 percent of the silent generation is alive today.

Instead, you're better off thinking about Michael and Gloria. They are boomers and would be 70 years old today.

Archie and Edith's chairs are empty. Michael (Rob Reiner) and Gloria (Sally Struthers) grew up.

Mario Anzuoni/Reuters

As a result, today's seniors bear little resemblance to those of 10 or 15 years ago. Today, Madonna is a senior. So are Ellen DeGeneres and Katie Couric. On Election Day, Magic Johnson will be 65 years old. ​While they may not feel like older voters to you, these boomers are the new older.

Together, boomers will make up more than 70 percent of the elderly by 2024, compared with zero percent when Mr. Obama, himself a baby boomer, won the presidency in 2008.

Boomers have a reputation for being conservative, but they are more liberal than voters older than them. The aging of the boomers, along with the shrinking ranks of those even older than the boomers, helps explain steady Democratic gains among seniors over the past decade.

In 2012, Republican strength among seniors was at its peak: Mr. Romney won seniors by nearly 10 percentage points. But in all probability, Mr. Obama won over today's older voters.

Voters aged 53 to 64 in 2012, versus 65 to 76 today, supported Obama by three points, based on a large collection of polling data. As a group, they would have written off much of Mr. Romney among the over-65s.

At the same time, millions more Conservative voters from older generations have died. Those who remain are disproportionately women and college graduates, and may be slightly less Republican.

Consider the character Mary Richards from “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.”

She made it, after all. She had courage.

Bettmann/Getty Images

The fictional Mary was born in 1940 and represented the new possibilities for women at work and in society. Mary, who earned a master's degree, would be 84 today and might be expected to vote Democratic. Many men of his generation, especially those without college degrees, did not make it to that age: Only 21 percent of 84-year-olds in 2022 were white men without degrees, according to census data.

Of course, just because Mr. Just because Obama will likely win today's seniors doesn't mean President Biden will. But in the last presidential election, Mr. Biden won 48 percent of seniors, a number nearly identical to our estimate of how Mr. Obama probably came out among the same voters. The simplest explanation is that compositional change, rather than a change in attitudes, has been driving Democratic gains.

Over the past four years, the last cohort of relatively Democratic boomers became senior citizens (younger boomers are politically more similar to Gen X and have not yet reached age 65). It is entirely possible that Mr. Biden will win today's seniors in 2020. If so, it is possible that Mr. Biden doesn't have to flip a single voter to turn seniors from red to blue in 2024.

Generation X and beyond

The aging of the boomers in the 65 and over category has had the effect of making the 45 to 64 group more conservative. That's because the relatively conservative Gen X now makes up the preponderance of those 45 to 64.

While Boomers have long been more liberal than the Silent Generation, Gen Xers have long been more conservative than Boomers. Generation X emerged in the midst of the Reagan revolution and was reflected in the hit show “Family Ties.”

Reading the President's lips.

NBC, via Getty Images

Alex P. Keaton, a Reagan-loving teenager with his mind set on great wealth, clashed with his Boomer parents, former hippies who had protested the Vietnam War and joined the Peace Corps.

Mr. Romney won over voters who were 41-52 in 2012, and who now make up many of today's 45-64 crowd (Alex Keaton would be 59 today). To a large extent, polls suggest they have moved to the right over the past decade.

Perhaps surprisingly, Democratic losses among younger voters over the past decade have canceled out the Archie Bunkers from the electorate, which is one reason the next presidential election seems so close this year .