Conservatives vs. liberals: Who wastes more electricity?

[marmar]

from Grist:


Conservatives vs. liberals: Who wastes more electricity?
By John Upton


Researchers at UCLA tested whether liberals were all talk when it comes to caring about the environment.

The findings: They are not, at least in the American West.

In a comparison of electricity bills and voter registration records of 280,000 households, left-leaning voters were found to be more likely to leave their lights and air conditioners switched off and conserve more energy — especially in the summertime — than were Republicans.

From Pacific Standard:

The difference in kilowatt hours suggests that left-leaning voters are less likely to respond to uncomfortable heat by reaching for thermostat. “Liberal households engage in voluntary restraint, largely by lowering air-conditioning in the summer relative to conservatives,” Dora Costa and Matthew Kahn write in the journal Economics Letters.

The difference between Democratic and Republican households’ electricity consumption was noticeable. But the difference between Green Party households and everybody else was particularly big. From the same article: ....................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://grist.org/news/conservatives-vs-liberals-who-wastes-more-electricity/

[jollyreaper2112]

1. ha

Liberals are more conservative than conservatives. How delicious.

I wanna see environmentalists confront the GOP. "Conservative! That's our word! You have no right to it!"

[sinkingfeeling]

2. Makes sense to me. Conservatives are only concerned about their own comfort.

[Jenoch]

3. Huh?

"“Liberal households engage in voluntary restraint, largely by lowering air-conditioning in the summer relative to conservatives,” Dora Costa and Matthew Kahn write in the journal Economics Letters."

If someone LOWERS their air-conditioning, then the energy consumption goes up, not down. Wait, maybe she just used a poor choice of words here.

[marmar]

4. I don't think she meant "lowering" the temperature, but lowering the amount of AC used.

nt

[siligut]

5. Our electric company distributes a usage graph every couple months comparing neighbors

We are consistently in the lower half. This is an old neighborhood with some big houses hanging American flags out front.

[CosmicDustBunny]

6. That's what did Jimmy Carter in - "Turn down the heat and put on a sweater".

The GOP response in 1980 was similar to Palin's "Drill Baby Drill" remark.

About 10 years ago we had a drought situation and were urged to restrict our water usage. Our standard rule has always been "If it's yellow, let it mellow. If it's brown, flush it down." The far-right (frankly lunatic) across the street had a van for his carpet business and he put a hand-made sign in the back that said, "Drought, schmout. Shower long and flush twice."

Jimmy Carter put solar water heating on the roof of the WH. One of the first things Reagan did was have it removed.

So where is the "conservation" in "conservatism"? I believe it does not exist.