"If You Prick Us, Do We Not Bleed? If You Tickle Us, Do We Not Laugh?" Jews and Pocketbook Voting

Abstract

Survey data from the 1980, 1984, and 1988 presidential elections are used to test the proposition that, contrary to the age-old stereotype of Jewish avarice, Jewish Americans are largely immune to "pocketbook voting"--the tendency to support or oppose the in-party candidate on the basis of improving or deteriorating personal economic circumstances. A vote choice model fitted simultaneously for Jews, Catholics, and Protestants indicates that pocketbook voting is no less prominent among Jews than gentiles, a finding in sharp contrast to the conventional wisdom about Jewish electoral behavior.