this post was submitted on 05 Oct 2024
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The gap sounds plausible, but I highly doubt the overall positions relative to 0.
E.g., the Federal Republic of Germany has had conservative chancellors for 51 years out of the 75 since it was founded. We did not have a constant left majority (I assume that is what they mean by liberal, since the actual sense of the term doesn't make sense as an opposite to "conservative").
Edit: I fucked up, this is only about people below 30.
These graphs only cover the demographic of 18-29 year olds, which historically do lean heavily towards progressive.
The difference by sex is the really interesting feature.
That explains it and I did indeed overlook it. Thanks for the heads up.
This is only a relative argument if you can prove the government accurately and granularly represents the population. That would be nice if it were true but speaking as an American, I find it hard to believe.
Keep in mind that our voting system is actually built so the parliament represents the popular vote as closely as possible. It's not just an assembly of winners of individual "winner takes all" decisions. The average being above 0 in the graph should indeed mean left parties would be in the majority more often than not.
Edit: Another comment reminded me that the graphs only show 18-29 year olds. That explains it somewhat.