Mike and Morley

Originally published
at Politico/The Arena

In this week’s Newsweek, Paul Begala suggests that the 2012 presidential election will be decided by “swing voters” in six battleground states — Virginia, Florida, Ohio, Iowa, New Mexico, and Colorado. But his definition of such voters is so out of synch with reputable polling data that the wiliest of Democratic political operatives must have been trying to fake out Republican readers of this piece rather than reveal the real Obama campaign strategy to Newsweek’s readers.

Begala identifies 916,643 “swing voters” as the 2% of the electorate in each of the six states who have not yet decided how to vote. He makes it clear that his pro-Obama super PAC, Priorities USA Action, will spend $2,181.87 to reach and presumably persuade each of the decisive voters, which is undoubtedly true. But then he gives a head fake to anyone trying to divine the super PAC’s real intentions by saying these undecided voters are disproportionately women, young voters, and Latino. Although it is true that these demographic groups are usually considered to be the most open to commercial advertising, there is little evidence in recent survey data that the relatively few “swing voters” within the electorate come primarily from these demographic groups.

For instance, the most recent Pew Research Center national survey provides analysts with an operational definition that Begala could have used. Using their data, “swing voters” would be comprised of either those who prefer a candidate other than Barack Obama or Mitt Romney; or those who say they are now undecided in the presidential election; or those who refused to answer the vote intention question. By this definition, “swing voters” comprise 6% of the total electorate in the Pew data. Contrary to Begala’s description, men (7%) and women (6%) are equally likely to be in this category. Older people are far more often “swing voters” than are younger members of the electorate. Among Baby Boomers (those 50-64), 9% are “swing voters,” while within the “Silent Generation” (those 65 years old and over), 7% meet this definition. By contrast, among Millennials (those 18-29), just 1% would be considered a “swing voter.” According to Pew’s results, older white folks of either sex (but especially older white women) are most likely to be “swing voters,” rather than young minorities. In fact, in the Pew survey, Millennials preferred Barack Obama over Mitt Romney by a 1.65:1 margin (61% to 37%) — by far the biggest spread between the two candidates within any age cohort.

One can only assume Begala described swing voters in the way that he did to trick Republicans into wasting their money on ads designed to persuade the least likely to be persuaded demographic groups. If Republicans fall for his head fake, the Obama campaign will run right past them and stuff the ball into the basket for a clear victory in November.

Millennials (born 1982-2003) were crucial to Barack Obama’s 2008 election. Other than the state of the economy, the most pivotal factor in determining the outcome of the 2012 general election is likely to be whether or not America’s youngest voters repeat their 2008 electoral performance in 2012.
In November 2008, Millennials comprised about 17% of the electorate and voted overwhelmingly for Barack Obama over John McCain (66% to 32%). With older generations dividing their votes almost evenly between the two candidates, Millennials accounted for about 80% of Obama’s national popular vote margin over McCain, turning what would have been a narrow win into a decisive seven-point victory.
So far, the data suggests Millennials are poised to support Barack Obama at the same level this year that they did four years ago. In a recent Pew survey, Millennials preferred Obama over Mitt Romney, the likely Republican nominee, by a 62% to 36% margin. But this year, Millennials make up 24% of those eligible to vote. Coupled with its partisan unity in comparison with older voters, the sheer size of the Millennial generation, America’s largest ever, could make its impact even more decisive in 2012 than in 2008.
Whether Millennials have that kind of impact depends on what the two parties do to attract their votes.  For Republicans, the best approach is to connect with Millennials before they are solidly in the Democratic camp for the next three or four decades. A few Millennial Republicans such as John McCain’s daughter, Meghan, and Kristen Soltis, a GOP pollster, have argued that their party should moderate its stance on social issues and immigration in order to have greater appeal to their highly tolerant and diverse generation. So far, however, the GOP presidential field has attracted relatively little Millennial support; through Super Tuesday, the Republican frontrunners (Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, and Ron Paul) combined had received less than half the Millennial votes that Barack Obama did in 2008. Perhaps the lack of Millennial interest in the GOP candidates explains why Republicans in at least half of the states are more focused on limiting Millennial voting turnout than in actively courting the generation’s support.
For Democrats, the concern is not so much the partisanship of Millennials, but their engagement. One way to reinforce Millennials’ Democratic leanings is to remind them of their stake in the election by emphasizing the Millennial-friendly policies the Obama administration has pursued. Help with the cost of attending college, funding more national service opportunities, and permitting young people to remain on their parent’s health insurance until age 26 are all initiatives the Obama team could raise with Millennials. Already that campaign is gearing up online and offline organizational efforts to bring Millennials to the polls in November that exceed the technological sophistication of its very successful efforts in 2008.
If Millennials vote in numbers proportionate to their presence among eligible voters, their continued support of the president should allow him to overcome any attrition he suffers among older voters. But if large numbers of Millennials do not vote, the president’s reelection chances will be sharply reduced. Whichever alternative occurs will very likely determine whether Barack Obama or his eventual Republican opponent is inaugurated as president on January 20, 2013.
Q&A on this blog were captured by Policymic here

 

In the end, the Democrats’ biggest Millennial concern is not likely to be the generation’s partisanship or opinions on issues, but its political engagement. 

The headline of a December 15 press release from the Harvard Institute of Politics trumpeted, “More Millennials Predict Obama Will Lose Bid for Re-election Than Win, Harvard Poll Finds.” The article elaborated that among all the 18-29-year-olds, opinion on this question is actually quite evenly divided into almost equal thirds: 36% believe that the president will lose in 2012; 30% think he will win; and 32% are not sure. Not surprisingly, conservative media and politicians jumped on the story with particular vigor and glee.

The headline was certainly provocative, but it hardly told the complete story about the Harvard poll’s results, to say nothing of Millennial political attitudes and preferences, entering 2012. The problem is that asking Millennials which candidate they expect to win an election may measure their awareness of the conventional wisdom that says President Obama is in deep trouble and that next year’s election is the Republicans to lose, but it says very little about how Millennials are actually going to vote in 2012. When Harvard asked that question directly, things look different. Obama leads among Millennials by double digits against all likely Republican opponents: 11 points versus Mitt Romney and 16 points versus both Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry.

The current state of Millennial Generation (born 1982-2003) political opinions and behavior is, in fact, reflected far more completely and precisely by a November Pew Research survey:

“In the last four national elections generational differences have mattered more than they have in decades. According to exit polls, younger people have voted substantially more Democratic than other age groups since 2004, while older voters have cast more ballots for Republican candidates in each election since 2006. The latest national polls suggest this pattern may well continue in 2012… One of the largest factors driving the current generation gap is the arrival of diverse and Democratic-oriented Millennials… This group holds liberal attitudes on most social and governmental issues.”

In the Pew research, Millennials prefer Barack Obama over Mitt Romney (61% vs. 37%) by about the same 2:1 margin that they voted for him against John McCain in 2008 (66% vs. 32%). Even white Millennials, a cohort that has received considerable attention from commentators in recent months for their modest drift toward the GOP, are evenly divided in the 2012 voting preferences (49% each for Obama and Romney). The president’s margin among Millennials is even greater against other potential Republican nominees than it is against Romney.

Moreover, Millennials tended toward the Democrats before Barack Obama achieved national prominence. Millennials identify as Democrats over Republicans by 50% to 35%. Majorities of Millennials also hold favorable attitudes toward the Democratic Party (51%) and unfavorable attitudes toward the GOP (53%). In the policy arena, by 56% to 35%, Millennials prefer a bigger government that provides more services to a smaller government that provides fewer services. This broad belief in governmental approaches in dealing with economic and societal issues is reflected in the almost 2:1 preference of Millennials for the expansion rather than the repeal of the 2010 health care reform legislation (44% to 27%) and for increased spending to help economic recovery rather than reducing the budget deficit (55% to 41%).

Millennials also hold opinions on a range of social issues that incline the generation toward the Democratic Party and Barack Obama. A majority of Millennials (59%) support the legalization of gay marriage, while only 28% of them agree that America has gone too far in pushing for equal rights. Probably because it is the most diverse in U.S. history (about 40% are nonwhite and one in five have an immigrant parent) virtually all Millennials (81%) favor providing a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.

Of course, the Millennial Generation’s continued clear support for Barack Obama and the Democratic Party is not a sure thing. Both the president and his party must convince Millennials that they can effectively use the government to fix the problems confronting their generation and the nation. But electoral politics is a two-way street. To win Millennial support, the Republican Party has to persuade Millennials that it and its potential presidential nominees are a viable alternative. So far, there is little in the Pew research (or any other poll) to suggest that they have done much to accomplish that undertaking. If anything, the GOP’s push to the right on both economic and social issues makes that increasingly unlikely.

In the end, the Democrats’ biggest Millennial concern is not likely to be the generation’s partisanship or opinions on issues, but its political engagement. The Pew survey indicates that only 69% of Millennials claim to care a good deal about who wins the presidency in 2012. This compares with over 80% among older generations. At the same time, a recent Gallup Poll indicates that the contentious struggle for the Republican presidential nomination and the performance of the party’s leadership in Congress may have taken a toll on the Republican Party and sharply narrowed the “enthusiasm gap” between the Democrats and GOP.

As a result, the participation of Millennials is perhaps even more crucial in 2012 than it was four years earlier. In 2008, the generation comprised about 17% of the electorate and accounted for about 80% of Barack Obama’s national popular vote majority. In 2012, as increasing numbers of Millennials reach voting age, they have the potential to comprise about a quarter of the electorate. If Millennials vote in numbers proportionate to their potential, their continued support of the president, as indicated by Pew, will likely allow him to overcome any losses he suffers among older voters. If large numbers of Millennials do not vote or are prevented from doing so by efforts in states across the country to limit their turnout, the president’s reelection chances will be sharply reduced.

The answers to those questions, not any current judgments on which candidate is likely to win, will very likely determine whether Barack Obama or his eventual Republican opponent is inaugurated as president on January 20, 2013.

The New York Times reports that many in the vanguard of the MyBarackObama.com phenomenon of the 2008 election are too worried about their economic prospects to expend the same energy on behalf of President Obama’s 2012 election campaign. Although the article also points out that there is an enormous outpouring of fresh blood now working on the Obama campaign from Millennials too young to have been eligible to vote in 2008, the report nevertheless highlights a critical issue for the Obama campaign’s plan to win re-election. 

President Obama will be re-elected if he can engage and turn out America’s youngest generation, Millennials (born 1982-2003), who still support him by overwhelming margins. In fact, the most recent Pew research shows a 20 point margin in Obama’s favor between the voting preferences of Americans, 18-29, and those over age 65, the widest generational gap their research has ever measured. 

It is certainly true that, despite the president’s personal popularity, economic concerns are weighing down his reelection chances.  Moreover, there is scant likelihood that economic circumstances in 2012 will be dramatically different than they are now.  So contrary to conventional wisdom, the economy, stupid, is not likely to hurt the president’s chances more than it has to date.  Its effect is already built into the poll’s numbers, which show Obama beating his most likely—and strongest—potential opponent, Mitt Romney, by six percentage points in the most recent Battleground survey. 

Nor are the often cited independents likely to be the group of voters whose opinion ultimately decides the election.  Surveys show that true independents, those who do not lean to either party in their partisan identification, make up at most 10% of all eligible voters. And this group tends to be the least informed portion of the electorate and therefore the least likely to vote.

Instead, the candidate and party that do the best job of turning out their base vote will be victorious a year from now. Right now, “the GOP benefits from a continuing intensity gap, with 79 percent of Republicans saying they are extremely likely to vote next November, compared with 65 percent of Democrats.”  And much of that gap comes from the current lack of attention and enthusiasm among Millennials as the recent Pew research documents.

In 2008, young Millennials provided more than 80% of Obama’s winning margin. In 2012 there will be 16 million more of them eligible to vote, making them almost one-quarter of the eligible electorate. With all polls showing Millennials prefer Obama over any of his potential rivals, including Mitt Romney, by the same 2:1 margin that they voted for him in 2008, there is only one clear, winning strategy for the President’s re-elect campaign to pursue.

Just as they have been doing with their recent focus on jobs and student loan burdens, the Obama campaign will need to engage Millennials with the same focus and superior outreach that they did in 2008. If it is successful in getting America’s newest generation to the polls in November, 2012 President Obama will win re-election and continue to usher in a new, Millennial era, in American politics. 

The 2012 election will present the United States with a stark choice between two radically different visions of the country’s future. Which of these competing visions becomes the nation’s future is likely to be determined by the strength and effectiveness of the Millennial Generation’s participation in next year’s election.

Whatever is said at this week’s debate, the Republican Party is sure to nominate a candidate committed to the vision of its Tea Party base, with even Mitt Romney now tacking in that direction. The mantra of smaller government, lower taxes and an unwillingness to engage in collective effort to solve national challenges has been embraced by every one of its candidates, most notably the current favorite, Texas governor Rick Perry, who has promised to “make Washington DC as inconsequential as possible.By contrast, President Barack Obama has continued to articulate the vision of “shared sacrifice and shared opportunities” that will be at the heart of his campaign message.”

In 2008, Millennials provided Obama with roughly 7 million, or 80 percent, of his 8.5 million popular vote margin.(www.millennialmomentum.com)  However, only forty-one percent of all Millennials, (born 1982- 2003) were eligible to vote that year. In 2012, about sixty percent of the generation will be eligible to vote, representing a potential voting block of one out of every four adult Americans. In addition to the sheer size of the generation, its philosophical unity makes it an especially powerful force.

By a 54 percent to 39 percent margin, Millennials favor a bigger government with more services, over a smaller government with fewer services, almost the reverse of the  attitudes of older generations.While older generations are split on the question, Millennials by a clear 51% to 43% margin believe government needs to regulate business to protect the public interest rather than accepting the GOP argument that such regulation usually does more harm than good. On another issue that divides partisans, Millennials, by 62% to 34%, favor the Supreme Court basing its decisions on what the Constitution currently means rather than how it was originally written.   

Millennials are equally unified against GOP conservatism on most of the current hot button social issues.  By 64% to 31%, Millennials favor gay marriage; only 40% of older voters agree with them on that issue. By an overwhelming 82% to 16% margin, Millennials also favor a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. The Millennials’ belief in sharing and inclusion extends to foreign policy, with 64% of them believing that the United States must take into account the interests of its international allies, even if this involves compromise.

While it is almost inevitable that attitudes like these will form the core of the nation’s civic ethos by the end of this decade, when Millennials will represent more than one out of every three adult Americans, the choice of which path to choose will be before the country in a much clearer and more immediate way in 2012.

          A few Republicans realize the danger this constituency represents to their cause. Some young Republicans, like Margaret Hoover, great granddaughter of the President and Meghan  McCain ,  daughter of the GOP’s last presidential candidate, supported by analysts like pollster Kristen Soltis, have warned their party that it must change some of their policies, particularly on social issues, if it is to make  inroads among Millennials. Other, more cynical Republicans have orchestrated campaigns in state after state to restrict voter turnout among Millennials, particularly college students.

 The challenge for Millennials is to overcome these obstacles and stay engaged in the process of change they initiated in 2008. Twice before in America’s history, a generation committed, as  Millennials are, to institutional change and a rebirth of civic purpose, guided the country through traumatic times and put it on a path to greatness.

From 1773, the year of the Boston Tea Party, until the ratification of the United States Constitution in 1789, Americans fought and argued about the type of government that would be true to the ideals of equality and inalienable rights expressed in the Declaration of Independence, but would also be strong enough to meet the needs of a new and growing nation. The Constitution, whose adoption finally resolved this issue, was devised by members of the Republican Generation (the Millennials of their day) such as James Madison. Their vision prevailed over the attitudes of older leaders like Patrick Henry, whose words Tea Partiers are fond of quoting. Henry  opposed the new Constitution as vigorously as he had supported the Revolution because of his fear of a more powerful federal government. .

About a century and a half later, from 1929 until 1941, the country argued over the wisdom of giving that very same federal government a central role in guiding the economy and providing opportunity and social justice for all Americans.  Thanks to the enthusiastic support of young members of  the  GI Generation, FDR’s New Deal for the forgotten man became so ingrained in the nation’s political consensus that not even  World War II hero, Dwight D. Eisenhower, challenged its basic premises when he became the first Republican president to be elected after the Great Depression. 

Now it is the Millennials’ turn to provide the same spirit and commitment to generating a new civic ethos for the United States in the 21^st century.  Whenever the country has torn itself apart arguing over the size and scope or purpose of government, the responsibility for resolving the dispute and preserving American democracy has fallen to its youngest adult generation.

 Which path the United States eventually chooses will be determined by the willingness of Millennials to engage in a vast civic endeavor to remake America and its institutions and the willingness of the rest of the country to follow their lead. The 2012 election provides Millennials with the opportunity to take control of this debate, pick up where they left off in 2008, and place the country firmly on a path aligned with their own liberal, Democratic beliefs.   If they become as involved in this presidential election as they were in the last one, their optimistic, problem-solving attitudes will eventually triumph over the doomsayers and doubters of America’s future and place a stamp upon the country’s civic ethos as enduring and positive as those of our Founding Fathers and the GI Generation. 

 

America is about to enter a presidential campaign that promises to be filled with divisive rhetoric and sharp differences over which direction the nominees want to take the country. This will be the fourth time in American history that the country has been sharply divided over the question of what the size and scope of government should be. Each time the issue was propelled by vast differences in beliefs between generations that caused the country to experience long periods of Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD), before ultimately resolving the issue in accord with the ideas and beliefs of a new generation.

Every eighty years America engages in this rancorous, sometimes violent, debate about our civic ethos.

The first occurred during and after the Revolutionary War and resulted in the most fundamental documents of our democracy: the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights.

The second took place during the Civil War. The 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments codified the outcome of that debate —- this time in favor of the federal government asserting its power over state laws when it came to fundamental questions of personal liberty and civil rights.  It took the Civil War and a massive increase in Washington’s power to accomplish the end of slavery, although it would be another century until the rights of freedom and equality were fully extended to African-Americans.

And in the 1930s, the economic deprivations experienced by most Americans from the excesses of the Industrial Revolution, and the collapse of corporate capitalism, led to support for a “New Deal” for the forgotten man that placed the responsibility for economic growth and opportunity squarely on the federal government. The government demanded by the GI Generation (born 1901-1924) greatly surpassed the conventional views of earlier generations.

In each case, the resolution of these debates depended on the emergence of a rising, young civic-oriented generation that thought the nation’s dominant political belief system   should contain a strong role for government, overturning the more conservative and limited-government views of the older generations then in power.

Now, as previously, the highly charged ideological arguments on both sides of the issue generate great agitation and anger among older generations, especially Baby Boomers, who have driven our political life towards ever wider polarization. As a result, the resolution of today’s debate over the nation’s civic ethos is not likely to come from older Americans who seem incapable of and unwilling to compromise their deeply held values and beliefs.

This time around, the largest generation in American history, Millennials, (born 1982- 2003), that  will comprise more than one in three adult Americans by the end of this decade, are destined to play a decisive role in finding a consensus answer to this critical question.   If the United States is to emerge from this most recent period of FUD, it will have to look to the newest civic-oriented generation, Millennials, for both the behavior and the ideas that will bridge the current ideological divide and spur the country into making the changes necessary to succeed in the future.

Millennials believe that collective action, most often at the local level, is the best way to solve national problems. Using social media, Millennials are organizing groups like the Roosevelt Institute’s Campus Network, to present a very different vision of America’s future. In this Millennialist future, the idea of top down solutions developed by experts in closed discussions will give way to bottom up, action-oriented movements. This will topple institutions as dramatically as Napster upended the recording industry, or the Arab Spring changed the Middle East.  Just as their parents set the rules within which Millennials were free to exercise their creative energies when they were growing up, the new generation will continue to look to the federal government to set national goals or guidelines, as has long been the view of Boomer progressives.   However, the way in which these guidelines are implemented will not be determined in remote and opaque bureaucracies, but by individuals in local communities across the country. In this way, Millennials will embrace progressive values, but with approaches that may be welcomed by many conservatives.

In the midst of the country’s current period of FUD, it is easy to despair that the nation will be unable to resolve its divisions and come to consensus about a new civic ethos. But throughout its history, when America has been equally fearful of the future, a new civic generation has risen to foster the necessary transition. In the end, this emerging generation served both itself and the country well. Now it is the Millennial Generation’s turn to serve the nation and move America to a less fearful and less divided future.

To hear more about FUD and its political implications, watch this video with Morley Winograd presenting his ideas to a gathering of USC students.

President Barack Obama has told his supporters that the 2012 presidential election will be about two contrasting visions of the nation’s future. In his vision, “everyone pays their fair share,” so that there is “shared sacrifice and shared opportunities” and the government plays a big part in helping the private sector prosper.

By contrast, the newest Republican candidate, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, pledged to those listening to his announcement speech to free the nation from “the grips of central planners who would control our healthcare, who would spend our treasure, who downgrade our future and micromanage our lives” and to “make Washington, D.C., as inconsequential as possible.”

These starkly different messages make it clear that America is now engaged in the fourth debate in its history about the size and scope of government and doing it with all the rancor and heated rhetoric that have characterized each of the previous debates.

The issue was at the heart of the debate over the ratification of the U.S. Constitution when newspaper printing presses were destroyed by those who disagreed with editorials on the issue. Eighty years later, it caused the nation to be torn apart during the Civil War. And 80 years after that, the Supreme Court declared minimum wage laws unconstitutional until a political consensus was framed around FDR’s New Deal that not even the court could resist.

Each time the issue of what the nation’s civic ethos should be has exposed vast differences in beliefs between generations. And, each time the country experienced a long period of Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt before the debate was resolved in favor of a new generation’s ideas and beliefs. This historical pattern suggests that the best way to predict the outcome of today’s debate is to examine the beliefs and attitudes of America’s newest generation of young adults, millennials, born 1982-2003.

In 2012, one out of every four eligible voters will be members of this generation. More than 40 percent of millennials are nonwhite, creating the greatest racial and ethnic diversity in the nation’s history. Twenty-five percent of them have an immigrant parent.

The generation was raised on messages of inclusion and equity and has translated those teachings into their political beliefs. A majority of millennials (54 percent) favor bigger government with more services, over a smaller government with fewer services (39 percent), almost the exact opposite of older generations’ opinions on that choice. Sixty-nine percent of the generation is accepting of homosexuality and believe that a growing number of immigrants strengthen American society, in stark contrast to the beliefs of their elders.

While older generations are split on the question of government regulation of business, millennials come down squarely on the side of regulation by 51 percent to 43 percent.

While these attitudes suggest which way the debate over the country’s civic ethos will ultimately turn out, it is the millennial generation’s belief in consensus decision-making and pragmatic solutions to problems that hold out the most hope that the tone of today’s political rhetoric will also change.

Millennials believe that collective action at the local level is the best way to solve national problems. Just as their parents set the rules within which millennials were free to exercise their creative energies, millennials look to the federal government to set national goals, even to establish mandates for required behavior. However, in the millennial era, the choice of how to comply with these requirements will not be determined in remote bureaucracies, but by individuals in local communities throughout the country.

In the middle of the vitriol of the current debate, it is easy to lose sight of the possibility of the dispute being resolved in favor of some larger and different national consensus. The millennial generation offers the country that hope. If America is to emerge from its current period of Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt, it will have to look to its newest generation, for both the behavior and the ideas that can bring the debate to a conclusion that the country can support. 

Read more: http://www.star-telegram.com/2011/08/29/3321721/winograd-and-hais-millennials.html#ixzz1WXGQCmkH

To hear more about FUD and its political implications, watch this video with Morley Winograd presenting his ideas to a gathering of USC students.

During his Twitter-fed Town Hall, President Obama admitted that the housing market has proven one of the “most stubborn” pieces of the economic recovery puzzle to try and fix.The President —- as well the Congress and the building industry —- should consider a new path to a solution for housing by tapping the potential of the very generation whose votes brought Barack Obama into the White House in the first place. 

The Millennial Generation (born 1982-2003) represents not just the largest generation in American history but the largest potential market for both existing and new housing in the United States. There are over 95 million Millennials and over the next five years the first quarter of this cohort will enter their thirties, an age when people are most likely to buy their first home.

Despite what is often written about this generation, it is very much interested in owning a home. Sixty-four percent of Millennials say it is very important for them to have an opportunity to own their own home; twenty percent named it as one of their most important priorities in life, right behind being a good parent and having a successful marriage. 

And, contrary to the usual claims of “new urbanists” (themselves largely members of the older X and Boomer Generations) most Millennials want to live in the suburbs where the current housing crisis is most acute. According to a study by Frank N. Magid Associates, 43 percent of Millennials describe suburbs as their “ideal place to live,” compared to just 31 percent of older generations, most of whom still yearn for the smaller towns and rural settings of an earlier America. 

Most Millennials already live in suburbs and enjoyed growing up in suburban settings surrounded by family and friends that supported them. A certain portion, of course, enjoy living an urban life while young, but most tell researchers that they want to raise the families many are about to start in the same suburban settings they grew up in. 

Furthermore, Americans between the ages of 25 and 34, both Millennials and those on the “cusp” of the generational change from X to Millennial, represent a greater proportion of the overall populationin the South and West than elsewhere. These are the very regions that suffered the most from the collapse of housing prices that stemmed from the mortgage financing scandals of the last few years. Unleashing this potential demand for suburban housing in these hard-hit areas would bring two huge benefits. It would stabilize prices for existing homes while at the same time boosting the prospects for new housing construction. 

The challenge is how to enable the Millennial Generation to achieve its desire to own homes without reigniting the speculation and unsustainable financial leverage that triggered the Great Recession. Clearly, in the immediate future at least, the current excess of supply in the housing market should mitigate the risk of too much demand chasing too few houses. As much as they are criticized by the financial industry and its Republican allies, the recently enacted financial regulatory reforms, might also provide an additional bulwark against allowing the market to misbehave a second time. 

But the biggest factor may be the lessons learned from experience. Millennials have borne much of the brunt of the Great Recession and tend to be keenly aware about the importance of living within your means Wanting a suburban home does not mean, that Millennials want McMansions; like earlier generations, especially their GI Generation great grandparents, they are likely to be cautious and frugal home-buyers. However, this frugality and caution does not translate into a meek acceptance or desire for a future as apartment renters, as some suggest will be the case. 
In the short run, Millennials will not be able to engineer a turnaround all by themselves; most Millennials can’t afford much beyond the next month’s rent, let alone the down payment on a mortgage. Many are still living with their parents to avoid having to pay rent and the cost of a college education at the same time. 

To address this part of the challenge, the federal government needs to do what it did to revive the moribund housing market in the 1930’s. The New Deal created today’s commonly accepted 30 year mortgages with a 20 percent down payment by making them a financial instrument that the newly formed Federal Housing Administration would insure. Before that landmark legislation, home mortgages were rarely offered for more than half of the home’s value and normally had to be repaid in no more than five years. 

As a result that era’s civic generation (the GI or Greatest Generation) was able to afford single family homes with a surrounding tract of land; an offer returning World War II veterans seized with alacrity. These houses now make up much of the country’s inner suburb housing stock. Today’s housing crisis requires a similarly radical reinvention of the basic home mortgage to be offered to those buying their first home. Under this proposal the length of the mortgage could be extended up to as many as 50 years, reflecting the increased life expectancies —- and longer working careers —- that most Millennials can expect to enjoy. Since no market for such debt instruments currently exists, it would be up to the federal government to create one through the process of reinsurance, just as it did in 1934. 

To further encourage home buying by Millennials, the federal government should also provide incentives to financial institutions to swap out the principle of the Millennials’ student loan in exchange for a new loan, whose principle would be collateralized by the value of the real estate the former student would be acquiring. The student loan would be paid off as part of the mortgage, making Millennials better able to afford a home and freeing up additional discretionary spending that current worries over student debt curtail. Today’s lower housing prices today might make this package both attractive to investors and financially viable.

Many economists today argue against the whole notion of encouraging home ownership by anyone, let alone young Millennials. Some point out that when looked upon strictly as an investment choice, the value of a home rarely appreciates faster than the overall stock market. This type of analysis, which forms the basis for arguing against any federal policy that would further encourage home ownership, ignores the proven benefits to the nation that derive from home owners committed to the success of their local community. Voting participation rates among home owners, for instance, traditionally run higher than rates among renters, and neighborhoods of owners tend to be more stableplaces to raise children. ) More important still is what homeownership means to the nature of a property-owning Republic. Survey after survey shows that home ownership remains a central part of the American Dream and a central aspiration, particularly for immigrants and young people. A policy that works against this ideal presents a political risk that any politician should be wary of taking.

To restore this part of the American Dream, and to lift the worry of millions of Americans whose house is worth less than what they owe on their mortgage, the Obama administration must take bold steps to restore a vibrant residential housing market. President Obama, who built his winning margin in 2008 through an unprecedented mobilization of Millennial voters, is the ideal person to combine a plan for economic recovery efforts with meeting the aspirational goals of most Millennials to own their own home.

To save the housing market, and extend the recovery beyond the financial elites, America will need a new wave of home buyers. If the President works to tap this resource, he can begin to turn around the “stubborn problem” of the housing market and restore the middle class economy. If he does so, the whole country will soon be tweeting his success.