Levittown Larry
| 🚗 | |
| Era | The Seventies |
|---|---|
| Age | 32-38 |
| Home | Bucks County, PA |
| Demographic | suburban, white, white-collar |
| Lean | Swing voter |
| Race | white |
An insurance systems analyst in his mid-thirties who lives in a split-level house in Bucks County, unattached to either party and uninterested in politics between elections. He is the cast's purest pocketbook voter, the type of voter who usually decides presidential elections.
Who they stand for
Larry stands for the white-collar suburban middle that Richard Nixon called the silent majority in a speech in November 1969. This was the Levittown generation. These were families who had bought new houses in the 1950s subdivisions of Bucks County, Delaware and northern New Jersey, and whose politics were shaped by the mortgage, the commute and the pay packet. They voted for Nixon in 1968 and 1972 as the less alarming choice, and they split their tickets freely between the two parties. A 1972 study of American voters named the ticket-splitter, rather than the committed partisan, as the decisive figure in national elections. The decade affected them directly. Wage and price controls were imposed in August 1971. Petrol shortages caused queues at the pump in 1973 and 1979. A recession ran from 1973 to 1975, and inflation passed ten per cent in 1974.
Larry differs from Main Line Margaret, who holds party office and attends party meetings, while he holds no office and attends none. He also differs from Macomb Bev, because no single issue has ever moved his vote the way one issue moves hers.
Playing to them
Larry responds well to a stable dollar, restraint on taxes, functioning schools, and a government that does not interrupt his daily commute. Competence and moderation are what matter most to him in a president. He rewards a president who sounds reasonable, and he is unimpressed by one who sounds too certain of himself. He does not forgive inflation, a tax rise on the middle income bracket, or disorder from any direction, whether from a university campus or a picket line.
A president rarely loses Larry's support by winning the support of someone else, which makes him a valuable voter to hold, but how a president wins his support still matters. A president who fights inflation with wage and price controls loses the support of Hamtramck Stan. A president who fights inflation with spending cuts loses the support of Coalfield Roy and Nonna Concetta. Berkeley Bruce and Sun City Dot both dislike the cautious, moderate governing style that appeals to Larry. Naperville Nancy and Main Line Margaret are usually won over by the same kind of governing, because they come from similar suburbs.
Where they live
The five states where Levittown Larry makes up the largest share of the electorate in the seventies:
- Pennsylvania
- Delaware
- Colorado
- New Jersey
- Virginia