Obama costs drive young to GOP

A few years ago, a British think tank called Reform dubbed 18- to 34-year-olds the “IPOD Generation:” Insecure, Pressurized, Overtaxed and Debt-ridden. Reform was referring to Britons of those ages, but its description of them could just as easily apply to their American cousins:

The “balance of taxation and public spending has tilted against young people, so that they now face an unfair burden, without being able to expect many of the benefits; and this at a time when their economic profile is already difficult. They are also faced with increasing levels of debt from higher education, much stronger labour market competition, lower growth in earnings and acute difficulties in getting onto the property ladder.”

Last fall, Barack Obama successfully tapped into IPODs’ angst, beating John McCain 2 to 1 nationally among voters aged 18 to 29 with his mantra of change. One of a handful of exceptions was Georgia, where under-30 voters broke for McCain by three percentage points.

Yes, Georgia as a whole went for McCain. But Obama won among under-30s in 13 states that went in the GOP’s column, including McCain’s home of Arizona, Texas and most of the South.

So were Georgian IPODs lagging behind their peers in recognizing the merits of an Obama administration? Or did they foresee that Democrats would pursue policies that will only increase the pressure, overtaxation and debt they face, without making them more secure?

Hope and change didn’t have a price tag during the campaign. Now they increasingly do, and the dollar figures ought to alarm young people. A new preliminary estimate by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, for instance, says a much-hyped Senate health care proposal would add $1 trillion to the federal deficit during the coming decade but would only increase the number of insured Americans by a net 16 million.

That’s $1 trillion more for young people to work off. In Georgia, IPODs’ resistance to such burdens is pushing them even further toward the GOP.

Young Republicans clubs across the state have added more than 200 new members to their rolls this year, says the state chairman, Cameron Fash. That’s a 90 percent increase. The Atlanta club — there’s also a separate Buckhead outfit — has doubled its membership to 145 and now attracts 90 to 100 conservatives aged 21 to 41 to its meetings.

The newcomers are frustrated with Democrats, Fash says, and with Republicans who didn’t govern as conservatives when they had a chance. But the majority of them “weren’t previously involved in politics, and they’re mad at themselves for not getting involved earlier,” he says.

“This is not the country that they wanted, these are not the policies that they wanted,” he says, “and they’re just fired up to get involved and try to make a difference.”

The issues that motivate these new Young Republicans jibe with the IPOD theory: fiscal responsibility from government, market-based solutions for health care and the environment, and more coherent state-level thinking on transportation and education.

“There are endless amounts of solutions out there for how we can solve transportation,” he said. “It won’t be cheap no matter what you go with. But there needs to be a long-term solution for how we move forward. Young people know it takes a long time to build roads, to build rail, and they want to see something done.”

Georgia has “put an emphasis on education, but it’s mostly been spending more money rather than new ideas. We’ve had some new ideas — charter schools, vouchers — that are forward-thinking and innovative, and they provide long-term gains that young people can relate to.”

The Republicans’ opportunity here is also a challenge. The GOP is still the majority party in Georgia, and young Georgians will be watching to see if it sticks to the conservative principles it sometimes abandoned once in power nationally.

To that end, Fash is encouraging his new members to get involved in campaigns for next year’s elections. Now that they’re coming of age politically, these IPODs can help to call the tune.

Kyle Wingfield, an Opinion Columnist, appears on Thursday. Reach him at kwingfield@ajc.com.