The 2016 Referendum, Brexit and the Left Behind: An Aggregate‐level Analysis of the Result

Abstract

Why did the country vote for Brexit? What was the relative importance of factors such as education, age, immigration, and ethnic diversity? And to what extent did the pattern of support for Brexit across the country map on to past campaigns by Eurosceptic parties, such as Ukip? In this article we draw on aggregate-level data to conduct an initial exploration of the vote. First, we find that turnout was generally higher in more pro-leave areas. Second, we find that public support for Leave closely mapped past support for Ukip. And third, we find that support for Leave was more polarized along education lines than support for Ukip ever was. The implication of this finding is that support for Euroscepticism has both widened and narrowed -it is now more widespread across the country, but it is also more socially distinctive.

Brexit: The Economics of International Disintegration

“…Controlling for age, gender, and ethnicity, Goodwin and Heath (2016b) find support for leave was 10 percentage points higher among households with income below £20,000 than among households with income above £60,000, but was 30 percentage points higher from individuals whose highest educational qualification is at the General Certificate of Secondary Education level (a qualification usually obtained at age 16) than from those with a university degree. While most studies of the referendum vote have focused on documenting correlations, Colantone and Stanig (2016) use an estimation strategy based on Autor, Dorn, and Hanson (2013) to show that exposure to Chinese import competition led to increased support for Brexit.…”

“…Among voters who backed staying in the EU, 73 percent thought "life in Britain today is better than it was 30 years ago," while 58 percent of leave voters thought life was worse. Econometric studies of voting outcomes by area (Goodwin and Heath 2016a;Becker, Fetzer, and Novy 2017;Colantone and Stanig 2016) and voting intentions at the individual level (Goodwin and Heath 2016b;Colantone and Stanig 2016) provide a richer picture of the demographic and economic variables associated with voting to leave.…”

“…Immigration played a central role in the Brexit campaign, and Goodwin and Heath (2016b) report 88 percent of people who thought the United Kingdom should admit fewer immigrants supported Brexit. However, studies find that a higher share of EU immigrants in the population is actually associated with a reduction in the leave vote share across local areas.…”

Celtic Phoenix or Leprechaun Economics? The Politics of an FDI-led Growth Model in Europe

“…In such an instance, the state risks alienating its domestic political legitimacy by promoting an economic growth model that accrues gains more to small segment of high-skilled workers than to the bulk of the electorate. Brexit is clear cut case of a political backlash against this type of growth regime (Goodwin & Heath 2016). Given the structural similarities of their economies, this should perhaps send a warning signal to Irish policymakers.…”

Will Brexit cause the whole Britain to leave the European Union?

“…Wales and England voted to leave EU, while voters in Scotland and Northern Ireland would prefer to stay in EU. Every one local authority area in Scotland voted for 'Remain', while every English region (except London and Gibraltar) was for ' Leave' 4 (see : Menon & Fowler (2016), Goodwin & Heath (2016)). It is the result of the referendum in Scotland, together with the position of the Scottish Government (consistently advocating Scotland's membership in the EU) that brought us about to analyse whether Brexit will cause the whole Britain to leave the EU.…”