Why the right is scared - Changing Demographics

[finecraft]

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/03_42/b3854001_mz001.htm

(SNIP).."The U.S. Census Bureau's newest numbers show that married-couple households -- the dominant cohort since the country's founding -- have slipped from nearly 80% in the 1950s to just 50.7% today. That means that the U.S.'s 86 million single adults could soon define the new majority. Already, unmarrieds make up 42% of the workforce, 40% of home buyers, 35% of voters, and one of the most potent -- if pluralistic -- consumer groups on record.

What many once thought of as the fringe is becoming the new normal. Families consisting of breadwinner dads and stay-at-home moms now account for just one-tenth of all households. Married couples with kids, which made up nearly every residence a century ago, now total just 25% -- with the number projected to drop to 20% by 2010, says the Census Bureau. By then, nearly 30% of homes will be inhabited by someone who lives alone.

This unprecedented demographic shift holds vast implications for everything from Corporate America to the culture wars; from government institutions to the legal system. Vast swaths of our social infrastructure are still modeled on the days when our realities were reflected in Leave It to Beaver, not Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. Corporate benefits, pensions, taxes, Social Security, educational funding -- all were designed in the last century to favor and encourage marital unions. "There's this pervasive idea in America that puts marriage and family at the center of everyone's lives," says Bella M. DePaulo, visiting professor of psychology at the University of California at Santa Barbara, "when in fact it's becoming less and less so."

Excellent article on the huge demographic shift that is occurring, and will continue to occur. This is why the right is scared...it's losing its traditional base. My single friends got zip with bush*'s tax cut, and they are sick of him pandering to the "American Family Values" arm of the extreme right.

[HawkerHurricane]

1. Just as the country shifted rightward

in the late 60's, the country is now shifting back to the left (starting in the early 90's)... And conservatives are freaking out, for they fear the shift will be on the same scale as the one that started with FDR's election... A shift in economics and society that will change the 'baseline' again to something they'll hate, and be unable to change.

[Wapsie B]

2. Caucasians

will not be the majority race forever. And by the time the shift is in full swing, maybe with a little help from natural selection the gene pool of the reich-wingers should be depleted. Their days of relevance are numbered.

[HawkerHurricane]

3. Don't assume...

that only caucasians are right wingers, because the majority of right wingers in this country are caucasians...

Plenty of right wing dictatorships in Asia, Africa and South America, where the leadership isn't pale Northern Europeans.