In a previous post (here and here) I discussed the ideological differences between a Rural Republican Texan and an Urban New Yorker. But what are the differences between Democrats and Republicans on economic and social issues in different states? Here’s a graph from the 2000 National Annenberg Election Studies. Each state represents the mean economic and social estimates (red states indicate self-reported Republicans and blue self-reported Democrats). Positive is more Conservative and Negative more Liberal.
There is no overlap between Democrats and Republicans on the economic dimension but some overlap on the social dimension. Democrats appear to be more economically cohesive than Republicans. Socially, WV Democrats are more conservative than Republican VT, NY, MA, CT and RI.
* Details
Economic scale averages across 10 economic questions
Social scale averages across 13 social questions
We can improve upon these measures by running an item response model