When the party leanings of independents are taken into account, 57% of the nation’s wealthiest adults associate themselves with the Republican Party, compared with 44% of the “99%.” At the same time, Gallup polling finds little difference in the two groups’ ideological views. Among the very wealthy, 39% say their political views are conservative, 41% call themselves moderate, and 20% liberal, similar to the percentages seen among all others…
Apart from their bank accounts, Gallup finds education to be the greatest difference between the wealthiest 1% of Americans and everyone else. The Gallup analysis reveals that 72% of the wealthiest Americans have a college degree, compared with 31% of those in the lower 99 percentiles. Furthermore, nearly half of those in the wealthiest group have postgraduate education, versus 16% of all others…
The educational differences between the nation’s “1%” and “99%” exceed all other demographic as well as political differences seen between these groups in the Gallup data. The next-most-significant distinction is marital status, with nearly three-quarters of the very wealthy (73%) being currently married, compared with half of all others (51%). Accordingly, by 49% to 31%, the very wealthy are more likely to have minor children in the household.
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