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How Did You Vote?
By Bizbox
Independent Street raises the question of whether the small business vote swung Democratic this time around (certainly the rest of the country's vote did!). To back up a bit: although small business owners, representing an estimated 15% of registered voters, are far too large and diverse a bloc to be solidly and always in one camp or another, they and their lobbies do tend to favor policies, particularly in the realms of taxes, trade, and labor relations, that themselves tend to align with the Republican Party. 
You can see this in the National Federation of Independent Business's post-election agenda; and we hear that card-check legislation, favored by Democrats and opposed by Republicans, is an especially sore point with the group. And, of course, Joe the Plumber was perhaps Sen. John McCain's most recognizable surrogate in the campaign's final days, casting himself as a sort of Everyentrepreneur (even if he wasn't, really).
Independent Street looks at donation numbers and finds that President-elect Barack Obama substantially outraised McCain, $20.5 million to $13.4 million, among those who listed their occupational industry as "miscellaneous business," a category that Independent Street said would include small business owners. Obviously that's not a hard-and-fast proof of any kind, especially when Obama outraised McCain overall by truly massive proportions. Still, it makes you wonder. As does the president of the National Small Business Association--a nonpartisan outfit--who said yesterday “Overall, we have seen a swing from Republican to Democrat” in this election, according to Independent Street.
Over 52% of all voters went for the Democratic presidential candidate this time around, the highest percentage since 1964, and so you have to consider that even a traditionally (if weakly) Republican group maybe also followed suit in the unprecedented support department. We pointed out that while pre-election surveys among small business owners tended to favor McCain, one also showed that Obama was significantly overperforming as compared to how people feel about the Democratic Party, so it would make sense if it turned out that he picked up a historically high number of entrepreneurs' votes.
Ultimately, though, that's in the past. Obama now has the opportunity to set a comprehensive agenda. We should consider how much he deserves the support of small business owners on its basis.
Comments (0)November 6, 2008 5:39 PM
