Quote:
Originally Posted by Docere
Yeah, that makes sense. To generalize, seems like DelCo is an extension of white ethnic and Black Philadelphia, Montgomery and Chester are affluent blue-trending suburbs (with Montgomery being fairly Jewish and Chester being more WASPy), and South Jersey more Italian American and less affluent/culturally liberal than the PA suburbs.
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I know this is an old post, but just rehashing.
This is such a tired trope about Delaware County. It is Philadelphia's smallest and densest suburban county but it is by no means just White Ethnic and Black Philadelphia. That categorizes roughly the far most eastern and southern portions of the county (roughly east of the Blue Route (476) and South of Rt 1), with a few exceptions along the I95 corridor south. Even that's not a completely fair dividing line because both Swarthmore and Springfield are east of 476 and both far exceed national and area income and education stats. A far larger portion of the county (geographically) is affluent and educated. Nearly all of the affluent areas are growing briskly.
All of the following school districts are either wholly are partly in Delaware County, and no one would describe any of these places as blue collar.
Radnor SD: (Radnor Township: Wayne, Villanova)
Haverford SD: (Haverford Township: Haverford, Havertown)
Rose Tree Media SD: (Upper Providence Twp, Media Boro, Middletown Twp, Edgmont Twp)
Wallingford Swarthmore SD: (Nether Providence Twp: i.e. Wallingford, Swarthmore, Moylan, Rutledge)
Marple Newtown SD: (Newtown Township: i.e. Newtown Square, Marple Township: i.e. Broomall)
Springfield SD: Springfield, Morton
Garnet Valley SD: (Bethel Township (i.e. Garnet Valley), Concord Township (i.e. Glen Mills), Chester Heights Boro)
West Chester SD: Includes Thornbury Township in Delaware County
Unionville Chadds Ford SD: Includes Chadds Ford Township in Delaware County
What's left I'd describe as middle middle class Penn Delco and Chichester.
The balance of the county is what I'd describe as either white ethnic blue collar (Interboro SD, Ridley SD, Upper Darby SD) or Black (SE Delco, William Penn, Chester). Even then, Upper Darby has surprisingly large swathes of upper middle class neighborhoods (Aronimink, Drexel Park, etc).
So no, the county is not just uneducated blue collar people. Also, Biden won Delaware County by 17 points, driven largely by voters in those affluent towns. Compare that to his performance in Nassau County NY.