Why are college students(18-22 yrs old) so liberal?

(This is an opinion post and it is VERY opinionated. It is my opinion. It is a departure from this blog's purpose but one that sometimes needs to be taken.)

Why are college students so liberal? More specifically fiscally liberal? Maybe a dose of the reality of the "real world" would make them more conservative? If you ever want a dose of reality about where our tax dollars go...spending about 30 minutes in the emergency room or the free clinics down at your local county hospital will turn a die-hard liberal into a conservative! I watched as people openly advised each other how to get more aid from the government without working. Watched as a perfectly healthy looking woman bragged about how she gets disability payments. Watched as they talked about food stamps, welfare, free rent, and so on and so on as if they were badges of honor. What I was seeing is how giving too much aid to a human being takes away their self-respect and their work ethic. Government aid does not help people. It cripples them. The tragedy of the government run Indian reservations should have taught us that lesson.

What was I doing at a county run hospital? I am a college student without health coverage. Does that make me a hypocrite? No, I am a college student who is improving myself in order to contribute to our society. Not to mention I am already fully vested in the Social Security System. My examples are of people who openly do not want to work and actually pursue more and more aid from our government. I have less of a problem with government aid as long as the recipient is going to school, working, or receiving vocational training with conditions.

Like previously stated, I have come back to college to finish my education. I consider myself to be a moderate that leans a little to the right but no one could ever call me a die-hard conservative or a toter of the Republican party line. Since coming back to college I have gotten a good laugh, every now and then, when overhearing a young college student spouting idealistic liberal thoughts for the world to hear. This happened so much that I thought to myself, "why are young college students so liberal?". Now, I am not talking about moderates who lean a little left. I am talking about the way left group. It is a fact(proven in polls...as much as polls can prove anything) that college students are more likely to be liberal than the overall population. My pet peeve and the focus of this article is how fiscally liberal young people are.  So, why are people fiscally liberal in college and then get more conservative when they get out into the "real world"?.

Here are four articles and polls siting the liberality of college students and faculty:
Data from Cal Berkeley
Data from UCLA
College Faculties: A Most Liberal Lot, Study Finds
Pragmatic Americans Liberal and Conservative on Social Issues


As the writers of South Park pointed out(Episode 902, Die Hippie, Die), college students are so liberal because they get on campus, take a freshman psychology class, a freshman humanities class, and all of the sudden they are experts on the world and how the world should be. As a person who has had to make ends meet in the "real world", I can not help but be amused by this phase that young students around me are going through. See, most of them are fresh from mom and dad's house. Most of them have never had to work for a living, and I do mean work for a living, not a part time job while in high school or college. They have not yet earned a $6000.00 paycheck that is only $4000.00 after the government is done taking their part in order to fund those idealistic programs that so many liberals want. They have never worked 60-80 hours in a week only to see other citizens of this country get paid for doing nothing or get paid for the simple act of having another child.

It is a fact that the general population is less liberal than college students so it is obvious that the realities of the real world, the realities of supporting a family, the realities of making a mortgage payment, and the realities of making ends meet everyday have the effect of toning down the idealistic but naive ideas of young college students.

And, yes, I know, I know, every young liberal college student is going to rail against this post and say it is not true, probably call me some bad names, but get back to me when you are 32 years old...tell me then if I was right or wrong. Obviously not everyone completely abandons their liberal views, or even their fiscal liberal views, after college but a large number do. And, yes, I know that college graduates are more likely to be liberal and that liberals take that to mean that to be liberal is to be enlightened. The reason college graduates are more likely to be liberal is because of liberal college professors. (Hmmmm? I wonder? Could it be that liberal professors are more liberal because they haven't been out in the "real world" either? Maybe not.) Anyway, college professors are overwhelmingly more likely to be liberal and, after four years of college, is it any wonder why college graduates are more likely to be liberal? Of course this is my opinion and I do apologize to any professors who are reading this blog. Especially any professors whose classes I am currently taking. I still want an A!

(Even if you hate my post...you have to admit that the South Park clip is funny!)