Who voted for Macri and why? We know the wrong answer, at least

Joint with Leticia Abad.

First things first: Macri won 90% of the Antarctican vote! Sure, that’s only 102 people, but hey, climate change. Just wait until the 2059 election. He also won everything in the Malvinas, getting zero of zero votes. Or did he lose big there? It’s not clear, but the newspapers are reporting it, so I am passing it on.

Second, last night’s result was only mildly surprising. Boz called it that Macri would outperform the polls but not go the distance, and that is what happened. Macristas are furious at Lavagna and Espert, but it’s unlikely that all of the votes for Lavagna would have gone to Macri. This was a clean win for Fernández, and a win is a win. In other words, “Lavagna cost it for Macri” is a wrong answer.

Larreta cleaned up the mayoral election in Buenos Aires City: who could have imagined that “Seven new subway stations in four years!” would have been a winning slogan?* Meanwhile, in Buenos Aires province, Axel Kiciloff won a massive victory. I have met Kiciloff in person. (As has my friend and colleague, Gónzalo Monroy.) Kiciloff is a smart fellow, but his understanding of markets is so weak that I have to wonder how he manages to go shopping.

I spent election day in San Isidro, a small bastion of anti-Peronism, so the traditional method of “Ask random people why they like Kiciloff” didn’t work. Election night was with Macristas in the city, so the method worked even less well.

A conventional wisdom is emerging here that Macri won where the farm sector is important. The only problem with answering “Farmers!” to “Who voted for Macri and why?” to that it is wrong. 

Map 1 shows per capita agricultural exports (including agro-industry). Map 2 shows Macri’s vote share. There is basically no correlation.

I don’t know why a band of provinces across the center of the country went for Macri, but it wasn’t because they voted out of fear of export taxes. An enterprising scholar should investigate this. Has Argentina seen an American-style “big sort”? Is there a cultural component to the anti-Peronista belt?

The same belt went overwhelmingly for Macri in 2015. In 2011, the Peronists won everywhere but San Luis, only with reduced margins. In 2007, the Peronists lost in Córdoba and San Luis. In 2003, there isn’t much of a pattern, but when you go back before that Córdoba and San Luis seem to be perennial bastions of anti-Peronista sentiment, something that has spread to a belt across the center of the country running from Mendoza in the west to Entre Rios in the east. 

Something interesting is happening; I just do not know what. 

* Other than, well, anyone.