WHAT LIES BENEATH THE SURFACE ILLUSION OF PLACIDITY…

BY FRANK GRAVES

[OTTAWA – June 15, 2009] - One of the more interesting analyses available from our recent data base (i.e., the 9,312 decided voters we surveyed May 7-28, 2009) is the movement of voters from the way they voted in the last election to the way they would vote in a hypothetical election today. Because of the unusually large sample size available, we can detect shifts even across the smaller parties.

Before we even consider who went where, it is notable to just look at the overall level of voter movement. The numbers in bold and on the diagonal in the table below represent “party loyalists”. These are the voters who plan to stick with the party they voted for in the previous election. As the table shows, the overall level of “loyalty” averages a bit over 70 per cent across the parties. This can be compared to a similar figure from the United States, which shows slightly over 90 per cent of American voters vote the same way from election to election. This reflects the fact that Americans are more ideologically polarized and committed to their political parties than Canadians, who are much more politically promiscuous, and less ideologically committed.

Voter Loyalty: 2008 to Current

This has important implications for election strategy. The recent American elections have focussed on wedge strategies to narrowcast the less than 10% of the electorate that are truly like to change their minds. In Canada, there is a much larger and more fluid pool of swing voters (nearly 30%). It may well be that the Karl Rove-like strategies of targeting finely parsed political segments to build a winning constituency (made up of a mix of disparate smaller groups) is not a sound, long term strategy in the Canadian context. Successful Canadian approaches – particularly those aimed at a majority – must be faithful to the middle of the road and then reach outward to build success.

Focusing just on Canada now, it appears that some parties are more successful at retaining their vote than others. The LPC and CPC are the best here, but the BQ are close behind. Note that the challenge for retaining voters is higher for the Conservatives, who had a considerably larger popular vote than the Liberals in 2008. Maintaining your vote when you were reduced to a modern nadir of popular vote is a modest, but essential achievement for the Liberals.

The poorer performance for the Green Party, on the other hand, is not surprising given that they have the highest incidence of first time and less likely to vote supporters. This problem is probably exacerbated by the radical inefficiency of their vote, which must discourage potential voters. Think about it this way: roughly the same number of Canadian voters supports the Green Party as the BQ. Which party gets roughly 50 seats and which gets none? It’s little surprise that there is a commitment problem with Green Party supporters.

The NDP is another issue. They have been hovering in the mid teens for a long time now and they do not have very high loyalty, despite the fact that they have exerted relatively high level of influence in this minority parliament. One gets the sense that if they were to slip even slightly they could surrender their status as the “other” party (i.e., non-Liberal, non-Conservative) to the fresher and growing Greens (who share many of the same constituency).

So who is successfully poaching who’s supporters? Our analysis suggests that the Liberals are the biggest winners to date. In fact, they are the only party that has improved its standing with voters. As the pool of all votes constitutes a “zero-sum” game, where did the LPC win this support?

The actual churning of votes is a much more significant and complex than the simple shifts in overall party support. A shift of as little as six per cent of voters could explain the current differences from the last election. Notably, however, the actual levels of movement are about four times higher than that, which suggests there is a relative frenzy of mobility lurking under the surface illusion of placidity.

The biggest overall movement, by far, is Conservative to Liberal. About 14 per cent of erstwhile Conservative voters have – at least temporarily – moved to the Liberals. At the same time, a smaller (but not insignificant) group of seven per cent of former Liberal voters have defected to the CPC. Recalling the different sizes of their 2008 election result, this means that that Liberals have “gained” 14 per cent of the 37.6 per cent of votes the Conservatives received (or around five per cent of all voters). The Conservatives, on the other hand, have recaptured only seven per cent of the 26.2 per cent who voted Liberal in 2008 (only about two per cent of all voters), for a net gain of about three per cent for the Liberals.

Other notable net gains for the Liberals are from the NDP and the Green Party (receiving, respectively, 18.2 and 6.8 per cent of the 2008 vote). As these were smaller voter bases, they constitute about 2.7 and 1 per cent respectively. Current figures also suggest that the Liberals would also lose about 12 per cent of 2008 supporters to these two parties, for a net loss of 3.3 per cent. So the net impact of these movements is about nil. The rest of the LPC’s gains from 2008 come from the BQ in Quebec and those who did note vote. The net gains from Quebec are mildly surprising. The case of non-voters, however, deserves special attention.

Liberals may be encouraged by the fact that they are faring well (and decidedly better than the CPC) with those that did not vote in 2008 – which includes a heavy concentration of what may become first-time voters. On the other hand, our research over time has shown that those that “did not vote” in past elections have a disturbing tendency to continue to sit on the side lines as younger voters show stifled yawns in viewing federal politics.

One final note is worth making. The most important fluctuating phenomenon is the Conservative to Liberal voter. It is a very specific portion of the past CPC vote (i.e., not the “Tim Horton voter”, but the affluent boomers who were solidly onside in 2006 but have since drifted to the Liberals). One of the key factors was distress about the economy, particularly the meltdown in equity markets which wreaked havoc on boomer retirement plans. As equity markets recover, this segment has shown signs of moving back to the Conservatives. More recently, the burgeoning deficit numbers snuffed out some of this movement, suggesting that the timing of the election may be critical for capturing this key segment.

Excerpt:

But an Ekos survey of almost 11,000 Canadians — more than 10 times the usual polling size — put the Liberals at 33.5 percent in public support and the Conservatives at 32.3 percent.

Under Canada’s first-past-the-post electoral system, a party needs to win around 36 percent of the vote to win a minority government and about 40 percent to stand a chance of capturing a majority.

“The overall picture these numbers paint is slightly more positive for the Liberals, who are ahead more days than they lag,” said Ekos President Frank Graves.

“But the situation is clearly quite volatile, and neither party could force an election right now confident they would win, much less form a majority,” he said in a statement.

Click here to link to complete article: Chances of a quick Canada election seen fading fast

I think the real value and implications of this poll may be missed. It has a huge sample. As you know  it also includes cell phones ( I believe you received a call from our robot). One unreported finding is that those who don’t include the growing cell only population (nearly one in four households in the United States now  and Canada is  trailing but following that pattern) will have increasing difficulties covering key parts of the population. Liberal supporters, for example, are higher in the cell only segment. This trend to cell only households is also much more pronounced in Quebec and amongst 18 to 40 year olds of moderate and lower socioeconomic status.

What is unusual, and we think valuable about the poll, is the ability to drill down and get a very detailed demographic and regional profile of the eligible voter population. Because of the very large sample sizes we can also examine daily trend without resorting to the 3 day moving average approach. This allows us to see some interesting shifts and test some key hypotheses. For example, we saw the Liberals opening up a five point lead since the announcement of the 50B dollar deficit. It’s possible some other factor explains this highly significant shift but it’s highly unlikely. It is also notable that the Tory “attack” ads don’t appear to be bearing any immediate fruit for them.

There are a range of analyses we will be rolling out in the coming days. For example we will be analysing where voters have migrated since the last election adn who is doing well with first time voters.

The economy is clearly a crucial factor but different parts of the economy are having diverse effects in different segments of the population. For instance, It appears that a sense that  the economy may be  turning the corner is overall  working mildly  in favour of the Prime Minister and the CPC. Although Canadians are not highly optimistic a sense that things look better than  they did three months ago is growing amongst older more affluent voters, who had defected from the Tories but were starting to return. Alarm over the deficit numbers may be extinguishing this recovery for the conservatives.  This mild recovery of confidence in the economy is not being felt by younger voters who are more tuned into labour markets (which continue to deteriorate) as opposed to the equity markets that affluent older voters are following. These contradictory forces are crucial to understanding the shorter and medium term prospects for the parties and they should factor into election timing questions.

In a shameless plug for the new suite of polling methodologies we are developing, I note that the in depth analysis of diverse demographic segments is beyond the reach of most online polls which are restricted to self selected group which opts in to the “panel”. These online approaches also excludes a very large number of households which don’t have broadband internet access. The approaches we are trying to bring together are based on the conviction that all members of the population should be able to appear in one’s sample and that the only method for recruitment is through a random invitation to participate. Problems with rising rates of refusals are no reason to abandon probability sampling. We will be linking this work with more detailed diagnostic work using our hybrid online-phone panel which allows in depth questioning of a more lengthy issues outside the reach of an IVR (robo-poll). The problems aren’t the online method of contact; it can work very well. It is the problem of assuring random probability sampling while using those methods. In our view, all polling should be based on random, probability sampling that includes the entire eligible population.

Excerpt:

The EKOS poll released Monday exclusively for the CBC suggests the Liberals would likely squeak into a minority government.

The poll found 33.5 per cent of respondents would vote Liberal. Another 32.3 per cent said they would vote Conservative, and 15.1 per cent said they would vote NDP.

The poll of 10,896 randomly selected Canadians was conducted between May 7 and May 28.

Up until the deficit news of May 26, the Conservatives appeared to have been benefiting from the fact some more prosperous Canadians, perhaps with an eye more to the stock market than the job market, were becoming more optimistic about the economic future.

However, their advantage among the more prosperous appeared to vanish after Finance Minister Jim Flaherty revealed Ottawa expected a budgetary shortfall of $50 billion for the 2009-10 fiscal year that will end in March 2010.

“The overall picture these numbers paint is slightly more positive for the Liberals,” EKOS president Frank Graves said. “But the situation is clearly quite volatile, and [none of the parties] could force an election right now confident that they would win, much less form a majority.”

Rounding out the poll, the Green party was the party of choice for 10.4 per cent of respondents, followed by 8.7 per cent who favoured the Bloc Québécois.

Click here to view the article: Minority government possible for Liberals

Excerpt:

“Polling done to support the Lansdowne Live bid also suggests there is plenty of interest in football across the region.

According to a survey done by EKOS Research Associates in December, 43 per cent of respondents said they’d be interested in attending CFL games, especially if they were played at a refurbished or rebuilt stadium at Lansdowne Park.

“That’s a potential market of nearly half a million to draw from,” says EKOS president Frank Graves. “It’s more than a good starting point — it’s excellent.”

Click here to view the entire article: Support serious business in Ottawa

Excerpt:

“Still, there’s hope beyond the coincidence of current concern. Ballot-box rewards wait for the leader or party able to convince Canadians that democratic reform is a commitment, not just another campaign promise to be scrapped once power has been secured.

Proof of that political potential is in the 40 per cent EKOS found who believe that democracy’s in failing health. Proof is found, too, in those who still bother to vote in the expectation they are electing a functioning government complete with democratic safeguards, not a four-year autocrat.”

Click here to read the entire article: Witnessing a Democracy’s decline

Excerpt:

“The Conservatives, it seems to me have spent the last four years or so trying to create an alternative national party and part of that was to make inroads into Quebec so they could no longer be accused of being a Western Party or just an anglophone party,” said Paul Adams of Ekos Research Associates, the firm that conducted the poll for the CBC. “The Conservative claim on the national label seems to be eroding.”

Excerpt:

“An Ekos Research poll published this week shows the Liberals seven points ahead of the Conservatives nationally. With an election almost certain in the next 18 months, Canadians are beginning to envision Mr. Ignatieff as their prime minister.

Two years ago, when he lost his first leadership race to Stéphane Dion, he was an outsider to his party and an unknown to the public. Now, he and his team are working hard to erase that notion.”

Click here to read the article: Portrait of a patriot?

Exerpt:

Fortunes have shifted substantially for Stephen Harper’s Conservatives since December, with Michael Ignatieff’s Liberals enjoying an upsurge, says a new poll from EKOS released exclusively to CBC News.

Asked which party they would support if an election were held tomorrow, 36.7 opted for the Liberals while 30.2 per cent chose the Conservatives. About 15.5 per cent supported the NDP, while the Green party was the choice of 8.1 per cent and the Bloc Québécois was backed by 9.4 per cent.

The survey was conducted using a hybrid internet-telephone research panel between April 8 and 13, and involved a random sample of 1,587 Canadians. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 per cent, 19 times out of 20.

Click here to view the entire article: Conservatives slipping, Liberals gaining

Beware the Echo Recession - The Globe and Mail

Now that we are deep into what appears to be a particularly savage recession, it is worth looking back at the last recession to see what we can learn. When I return to my polling data from the 1990s, the lesson is clear: The public’s sense of economic security is a fragile thing, and it does not always mirror what is happening in the “real” economy.

Even though Canada technically emerged from the last recession as early as 1991, as the nervous nineties unfolded, a sense of economic confidence and security emerged only slowly and painfully. In fact, it took roughly six more years for the public to recover its sense of optimism. That lag contributed to an “echo recession,” in which recovery was slower than it might otherwise have been, because of the public’s reluctance to invest and spend.

Just as an “irrational exuberance” can lead to the economic troubles we now face, by tempting people and businesses to make what in retrospect seem like irrational bets, an excessive pessimism in a downturn can impede our ability to return to robust growth.

We already know that the current downturn is having an extremely deleterious impact on consumer intentions. In a recent survey, we found that two-thirds of Canadians plan to cut back their spending on big-ticket items such as cars, appliances and computers. Interestingly, this is true even though the public continues to be more optimistic than most economic forecasters about the depth and duration of recession, and the ability of government to address it. Fears of job loss, for example, are still much lower now than they were in the mid-’90s, when the jobless rate had fallen considerably from its peak in 1993.

If the forecasters are right, consumers probably will become gloomier as reality sinks in. And the history of the last recession shows that the gloom does not lift anywhere near as quickly as growth returns.

This dynamic in public opinion is going to make recovery harder. It may be prudent for consumers to act cautiously during periods of economic decline; but when the economy starts growing again, this caution undermines the recovery. The point is that once the public’s sense of economic security is surrendered, it is very difficult to restore.

It may well be that corrosive impacts of this “echo recession” may be as serious as the recession itself. Unlike the recessions of the early 1980s and ’90s, the current downturn is taking place in a demographic context that may magnify the exaggerated sense of economic insecurity.

Canada had the largest baby boom of any advanced Western society, save Australia. The exuberant yuppies of the ’80s are now shell-shocked grumpies. As equity markets smoulder in ruin, the iconic Freedom 55 now looks like Freedom 95.

But we do not have to despair in the face of this likely echo recession. There are ways to reduce its length and severity. As governments spend and central banks loosen monetary policy in a neo-Keynesian frenzy to jump-start the economy, they should focus on the problem of the echo.

One approach has been the “noble lie.” Prime Minister Stephen Harper, President Barack Obama, Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney and U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke have all been suggesting that things are better - or will soon be better - than they manifestly are. Maybe they have no choice, given that much of the media have seized almost gleefully on the most apocalyptic pronouncements of economists and other “experts.” The net effect, however, is likely to confuse the public.

We also know that exaggerated risk perceptions are highest when the source of fear is relatively alien or unfamiliar and when individuals feel they have no direct control over their circumstances.

So what to do? A skeptical but, by historic measures, relatively sophisticated public wants absolute candour. And individuals have to be shown ways in which they can fit themselves into the economic recovery.

There is no magic bullet that will cause the public to recognize the end of the recession and act accordingly. But there are three things we can do to minimize this problem.

First, we can shift away from specious forecasts and conjecture to provide the most rapid, accessible and neutral picture of actual economic performance. We need a distilled summary of where we are, day to day and week to week. This should come from a blue ribbon source such as the Bank of Canada, but it should come faster than it does now and be more accessible to ordinary people. Cutting the lag time between economic reporting and economic reality would reduce our reliance on the cacophony of conflicting forecasts.

Second, we should focus stimulative spending on reconstructing our economy for the 21st century. Our research indicates that Canadians are just as concerned with where we will be in 10 years as they are about the current recession. So let’s fill the potholes, but let’s also construct a world-leading post-carbon economy.

Third, the crucial mechanism for determining both individual and national success in the 21st century will be knowledge and innovation. We need a blueprint that will allow us to combine a smarter, more agile population with technical and business innovation to elevate our competitive position. Canadians want higher productivity and the better quality of life that comes with it. They want to feel a sense of participation and ownership in efforts to rebuild our economy - and if they have that sense, they will go out and learn, innovate, invest and buy.

Click here to view the article on the Globe & Mail website: Beware the Echo Recession

Click here for a backgrounder: ekos-echo-recession-background-material