You Get More Right Wing As You Get Older. Really?

 

Why this right wing drift is (perhaps) an illusion

It is a common mantra that as you get older you politically move to the right. There is even a graph which shows a cross over age where those below it are more likely to be left wing while those above it are more likely to be right wing. Here’s a version of it from YouGov. (it’s a bit old - 2017 but shows this perfectly).

Of course, it’s no longer just mainly Labour versus the Conservatives. But basically if you were to draw this today making it Left wing vs Right wing instead, it would look much the same.

This graph is from a reputable polling company using reliable data. So it is perfectly reasonable to assume the graph is correct. And (in its way) it is!

BUT (and it is a big but) it doesn’t tell the full story. It can lead to a belief that a typical radical 20 year old will, by the time they reach (say) 40 be voting Conservative or even Reform.

Of course that can happen and probably sometimes does. But it is very far from a given and I would suspect very few young, ardent Left Wing voters will actually make that journey.

So where does this graph fall down? Again I repeat - the graph (in as far as it goes) is without a doubt - correct!

Lets illustrate this with the likely political journey of a young left wing voter. Lets call her Jayne.
Jayne is 20 years old and once avidly supported Jeremy Corbyn. She now bats for the Greens or maybe just the wilder realms of the extreme left of the Labour party. She is passionate and committed to her political beliefs.

Is Jayne (in 20 years time) going to start eulogising Margaret Thatcher?

Hardly likely is it? But that does not matter. Why? Try this as an explanation.

Sure. Jayne and her fellow young voters overwhelmingly support left wing parties. But they are unusual within their age band.

They are unusual because they actually vote. But even more so they are unusual because they are interested enough in politics to ensure they are properly registered to vote. Somewhere around 20% of 18-24 years olds are simply not even registered. They are not on the electoral register and so cannot vote. (Some estimates put this as high as 30%)

In 2024 the turnout for the General Election was the lowest since 2001 and the second lowest since 1918. It stood at a dismal 59.7%. But that is across the board. Turnout for the 65+ age group nationally was estimated to be the high 70’s to 80%. For the 18-24 group it was estimated to be 46%. But that is 46% of registered voters. If you include the missing 20% who are not even registered that reduces to 34% (Ipsos put it at 37% so I’ll use that from now on).

So while Jayne and her friends drive a 70% left wing vote in their age group, at the end of the day, of people in the 18-24 age group only 25% voted for the left wing candidates.

Sure: Even less voted for right wing parties. But however you cut it, a significant majority of the 18-24 group simply did not vote. Over 3 million of the 18-24 group stayed at home on election day 2024.

But as people get older they tend to drift towards voting. Turnout by age band increases. More and more people in an age group vote and fewer and fewer go unregistered.

So while Jayne may still stay true to her left wing values as she gets older, the new voters that join her at the ballot box may well hold entirely different views.

This makes it appear that the original younger voters are moving rapidly to the right but in fact the dilution of the left wing bias is due to an increasing number of individuals engaging with the electoral process as they get older.

Here’s an estimate of the turnout for each age group at the 2024 General Election:

And here’s how each age group voted. Remember this was the General Election where the Conservative vote collapsed. Even so, with a 73% turnout those elderly 75+ Conservative voters produced more than double the votes that the 18-24 group did for Labour.

Also notice that the 75+ group produced as many votes for Labour as did the 18-24 group! In other words when comparing these two similarly sized groups both had roughly the same number of Labour supporters. The young Labour vote in 1980 was now the old Labour vote in 2026. Maybe?

So I’d suggest that while a drift to the right is quite possible as a person ages, the amount of drift that will happen (for these young voters in particular) is generally overstated. Those who vote young may well keep their fundamental political affiliations as they get older. What changes is that those initially less engaged with politics come along and start voting too.

And they are far less likely to vote for Left wing candidates.

Originally published on SubStack before being moved here. Read more in this post.