The decline of social democratic parties: Yet a matter of economic policy?

This study contests the emerging consensus that the educational realignment in voting behavior is centered on non-economic policies. Leveraging comprehensive post-election surveys and party manifesto data, I examine voter responses to previously underexplored dimensions of economic policy - most notably, predistribution versus redistribution. The analysis reveals that parties emphasizing predistributive over redistributive economic policies tend to attract disproportionately greater support from less-educated voters. This pattern aligns with evidence that lower educational attainment is associated with a stronger preference for predistributive policies. The strength of educational divides in voting responses, particularly pronounced for Social Democratic parties, overlaps with the intensity of educational divides in policy preferences. Both divides are more pronounced in the US and Germany and comparatively weaker in southern European countries. Finally, I examine several potential mechanisms underlying the educational divide in economic policy preferences. I identify openness to change and political interest as the most influential factors, while finding little support for a range of alternative explanations.