The political behaviour of millennials has recently garnered some attention, given their apparent attraction to disruptive figures. But the boomer generation may prove to be just as interesting in the next few elections.
Social researcher Ian Watson found that the cohort that came of age in the 1960s and 1970s in Australia is not as politically homogenous as the pre-boomer generation. He tracked Coalition support from 1987 to 2010 using Newspoll data, which showed that voters aged 40-59 were set to complicate the conservative leanings of the 60-plus bracket.
Coalition support had held up among the older bloc until 2004. But as early boomers approached retirement, their aversion started showing up in the graphs.
For example, the gap in Coalition support between those aged 50-59 and all age levels evaporated in the 2007 and 2010 elections. That is, while the 65-plus cohort still overwhelmingly supported the Coalition, the proportion of Coalition supporters in the group immediately younger appears smaller.
This is borne out in the latest Morgan polls, which show Coalition support at 61 per cent among 65-plus, and 55 per cent for 50-64-year-olds. The Coalition lead over Labor in the next age group, 35-49, is even slimmer at 52 per cent.
If the life cycle thesis, which holds that older voters are authoritarian and conservative, turns out to be unreliable, then political strategists may have to recalibrate, and soon. Based on the latest AEC enrolment figures, voters aged 65-plus account for less than a quarter of the total. Those aged 18-34, who tend to prefer Labor (and lately, the Greens) account for more than a quarter.
The interests of this younger group are already being brought to bear on policy areas. Negative gearing and capital gains tax concessions are primarily seen as fiscal matters, but their structural effects on intergenerational mobility mean that millennials have a vested interest in reform.
They bristle at boomers — perhaps reasonably, given the housing insecurity, work casualisation and economic volatility that they inherit. But what gets missed in anti-boomer sentiment is that on social issues at least, a 21-year-old today might have more in common with a 61-year-old than a 71-year-old.
The formative experiences of Australian early boomers, those born in the decade after 1945, include unprecedented access to university education and health care, immersion in feminist discourse, Aboriginal land rights campaigns, environmental activism, LGBT movements and pacifism. Quite remarkably, it mirrors some of the elements that engage millennials.
Generational experiences have