The outcomes of the various state Democratic primary elections have been parsed, sliced, filtered, distilled, and analyzed in many ways. We've seen some trends regarding race, income, and education, but the area I find most interesting (and alarming) is age. Polling has morphed (as one might expect) throughout the primaries, but there's been a clear trend of younger voters supporting Sanders and older voters supporting Clinton.
A January Quinnipiac poll found support from voters age 18-44 at 78% Sanders / 21% Clinton. The same poll found Clinton favored 53% to 39% among voters age 45-64, and Clinton favored heavily at 71% to 21% among voters over 65. Exit polls after the New York primary had Clinton winning 70% of voters over age 65, and Sanders winning 72% of voters ages 18-29. While there certainly are young voters who support Clinton, (just as there are voters in their seventh and eighth decades who support Sanders), it's hard to escape the message that this trend sends to a large swath of younger voters: "Sorry, kids - but the things that you think are most important just don't matter as much to the rest of us".
This is surely an oversimplification of the complex (and sometimes contradictory) motivations that each voter possesses. There are no doubt voters who love everything that Sanders stands for, but think that Clinton's experience and pragmatism are the way to get there. But when Sanders builds his "revolution" on ideas like mitigating climate change, single payer health care, tuition-free college, a minimum wage people can live on, ending Wall Street recklessness, reviving the middle class, etc. and brings out young people in huge enthusiastic crowds, but is rejected by older voters in large numbers, it's not hard to imagine that young people might perceive that these priorities - their priorities - are not those of their elders.
This feeling is only amplified when they hear comments from older Clinton supporters along the lines of "Bernie's got great energy, but I don't want a revolution. Things aren't perfect, but they're working out mostly okay for me. Why risk it now?" Or, "I don't like Wall Street anymore than the next guy, but I want to make sure my 401K remains intact, so someone as anti-Wall Street as Bernie scares me." Every voter needs to look out for their own interests, and these sentiments are honest reflections of that need. But to Sanders supporters - especially the young ones who make up his key demographic - it sounds a lot like the IGMSY (I Got Mine, Screw You) attitude that many of us on the left often perceive to be a core principle of today's conservative ideology.
Most 25-year-olds don't have a 401K, and many do not have any employment prospects that would provide one. Many have "reverse 401Ks" in the form of large student loan debt that bars them from fully participating in the economy today and steals from their retirement security tomorrow. They'd love to benefit from steadily increasing home values in a stable economy, (if we can get one) but they can't afford to buy a home (student loan debt, again). They're not worrying about their investments, they're worrying about making the rent. They see a dying planet that's running out of time, an economy that doesn't work for them (even if they are well-educated), and a future that looks a lot like their 38 year-old brother who still doesn't own a home or have any kids because he's been playing this losing game longer than they have.
They don't want radical change because they're young and it's cool. They need radical change if they are to have any hope. Most of them (Ron/Rand Paul Libertarians notwithstanding) know that such change won't come from the right, so when they look to the left and find a substantial majority of older players on their home team standing in the way with their arms crossed, what are they supposed to feel? Perhaps it might be "our parents just don't get it", but what if it's "they don't really care about us"? When we ourselves become so old as to be dependent upon them for our care and well-being, I sure hope the feeling isn't mutual.
Sanders has energized the youth vote to a very large extent by speaking to their needs, and regardless of whether he wins or loses, their votes and continued involvement/activism will be necessary both to keep conservatives out of the White House and to move our country and planet toward a sustainable future. If the Democratic party wants their support, it has to convince them that it has their interests front and center. If Clinton is the nominee (as has been likely for some time), and especially if she is president, she and those who support her will need to sincerely engage young people - many of whom supported her opponent - for the future of the Democratic party, the country, and the planet.
If they won't, young people will eventually find/create a party that will. Given the trends in wealth disparity/income inequality, things are going to move in a direction consistent with what Sanders is advocating. (Or, the world will collapse into violence first…)
Young people are going in Bernie's direction with or without the rest of us, but why wait? There is tremendous opportunity in our young people.
We must not let it go to waste.