Political Leanings by Occupation and Industry

[sanantone]

I accidentally came across this webpage today. The top portion shows the political leanings of various occupations, and the bottom portion shows political leanings by broader job types. The charts are based on FEC data of campaign contributions. 

http://verdantlabs.com/politics_of_professions/

Very cool chart - thank you for sharing.  Union organizers seem to be like 99.9% Democrat.   It’s fun seeing the difference between a taxi and a truck driver being on opposite sides =)

I found the comparison between bus drivers and school bus drivers to be the most interesting since they do similar jobs, and I used to be a transit bus driver. There are, however, some notable differences. Metropolitan bus driving is a blue collar occupation that is largely found in public organizations. So, unions are going to be common. Most school bus drivers are part-time employees, and most appear to be retirees and stay-at-home moms.

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The thing that shocked me was the huge difference in pay between VIA (San Antonio) and CapMetro (Austin) bus drivers. VIA bus drivers now make $17.81 an hour to start while CapMetro bus drivers made around $13 an hour to start the last time I checked, and Austin has a much higher cost of living. Then, I found out that many of CapMetro's bus drivers don't work for CapMetro; they work for a for-profit company CapMetro contracts with. There's also a huge difference in pay between unionized, government corrections officers and private corrections officers. Many people are surprised by the almost 50/50 split in law enforcement, but I'm not. I understand why almost half prefer pro-union candidates.