Absolutely Relative: How Education Shapes Voter Turnout in the United States

Abstract

Why has voter turnout in the United States not increased proportionally with educational attainment over time? Relative education theories have attempted to answer this question by highlighting how the value of individuals’ education may be influenced by the educational levels achieved by others. For instance, individuals may attain a higher level of education compared to previous generations, but the relative value of their education may not improve if society as a whole also achieves higher levels of education. Thus, this increased educational attainment may have little influence on voter turnout. Using a new measure of relative education and incorporating more recent post-2000 data, this research finds that while the relative education model explains the education–turnout relationship prior to 2000, since then individuals with a higher absolute level of education have been more likely to vote, regardless of the relative value of their education. The rise in voter turnout over the past two decades could be attributed to this increase in the absolute level of education.