North Carolinians on the Issues

There's been some interesting shifts lately in terms of what North Carolinians list as their top issues. Here's how the top five for voters in the state have broken down since the beginning of 2008, looking at it every four months:

Top Issue	1-08	5-08	9-08	1-09	5-09
Economy	39	43	53	64	43
Moral/Family Values	13	12	10	10	18
Education	-	5	-	6	10
Taxes	-	-	6	5	8
Health Care	8	-	-	-	8
War in Iraq	22	24	15	7	-
Immigration	9	5	6	-	-

What seems particularly interesting here is the large decline since the start of the year in voters listing the economy as their top issue. Most of this movement has been among conservative Republicans, who have shifted their biggest concern to being moral and family values, most likely due to the recent increase in states legalizing gay marriage. This presents an interesting conundrum for Republican voters. Many, especially at the national level, think that the party needs to move to the center to get things turned around and that gay marriage in particular is an issue that really hurts the GOP with young people. But at the same time we have an increasing number of Republican voters in the state who are getting more and more squeamish about this issue and are going to want the party to stand as firm on it as possible. When your party's base is moving to the right while the path to victory is moving to the middle you have a party with an identity crisis, and that's pretty clearly where the Republicans stand today.

The drop in voters naming the economy as their top issue is not exclusive to Republicans though. An increasing number of Democrats are saying it's education or health care, somewhat of a return to pre-recession norms. I'm not sure why that is since the economy is clearly not fixed, but maybe people are realizing that life goes on even if you have to make some changes to how you would normally do things during tough times. There also may have been a feeling late last year and earlier this year that the worst was yet to come that perhaps has passed. It is nevertheless surprising that the economy is at the same exact level of voters naming it as their top issue as a year ago at this time, given everything that has transpired.

One final note: immigration, so high on the list of issues for North Carolinians throughout much of 2007, still has not returned as a big concern for voters in the state even as the number of people saying it's the economy has declined. I don't think it's that voters are getting more liberal on the issue so much as that it's just not a priority concern for them. At this point it's hard to imagine it being a big issue in the 2010 elections.