"It’s perfectly reasonable for a lower-income person to think this is in their interests." Sad to say, there's a fool born every minute.

...................................................................................................................................................................
COMMENTS: 
*  The people I personally know who vote Republican are the very rich, the poorly educated and those who think of themselves as being morally superior and have been manipulated into believing that this is the morally superior party. Interestingly enough, several of them (women included) subscibe to the Newt Gringrich/Donald Trump/John McCain, et. al, view of marriage. Stay committed only as long as it takes to obtain what you believe to be an upgrade. Only the very rich people I know vote Repubican because of economic policiies. 
*  No contest, the Democrats are doing better. All I have to do is remember late 2008 before Obama took office to be reminded of how much better the Democrats do managing the economy. As for wages, I don't see Republicans working to raise the minimum wage. It's the Democrats who are doing that. The Republicans don't give a rat's a$$ about middle-class incomes, let alone those of the poor and working class.
*  Some people still believe in the republican trickle down theory. The idea that "a rising tide lifts all boats" is simplistic in nature and people that are hurting want to believe it, but it's not going to happen.
*  There is nothing conservative about Republican economic policies. At least since Reagan, every time there is a Republican administration, the deficit soars. Every time there is a Democratic one, it plummets. Growth in government spending is also considerably higher under Republican administrations. Spending money you don't have isn't conservative.
*  Do you realize that you stated facts therefore you aren't going to get a rationale intelligent response. They are going to say this is a lie, you are a liar and your source is a liberal propaganda machine. They would only believe this if it was on FOX News!
*   Poor whites don't see themselves as such, they much prefer the "struggling middle-class" as their nomenclature. Perspective is everything. What we really have is an inequality in voter turnout. For instance; in 2008, only 41% of voters who earned less than $10,000 actually voted, whereas 78% of those with incomes over $150,000 showed up at the polls.
...................................................................................................................................................................
No, it’s not new that some working-class and poor whites vote Republican
By Andrew Gelman, May 2, 2016

A trope of political journalism is to wonder why many lower-income voters prefer the Republican Party despite its more conservative economic policies.

For example, here’s Jelani Cobb last week in the New Yorker:

Ever since Ronald Reagan’s Presidency, progressives have pondered why working-class and poor whites vote Republican, against their own interests.

It may well be that progressives have pondered this, but I have two things to say.

First, how can you be so sure it’s “against their own interests” to vote Republican? The Republican Party supports policies such as lower taxes, higher military spending and, more recently, immigration restrictions. It’s perfectly reasonable for a lower-income person to think this is in their interests.

Second, if you want to ponder this, you should realize that lots of lower-income whites have been voting Republican for a long time. Here’s a graph showing the Republican share of the two-party vote for president in each election from 1940 through 2004, looking separately at voters in the lower and upper third of income (not quite “rich” and “poor” but an easy way to summarize survey data without running out of sample size). In the early part of this series, of course, almost all these voters were white:


In the 1940s, the Republican opponents of Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman were getting votes from lower- as well as upper-income voters. In the 1950s and 1960, Republican candidates Dwight Eisenhower and Richard Nixon did just about as well among lower-income voters as among those with higher incomes.

There have been changes over the years, and in the past few elections, the gap between the Republican vote share among rich and poor whites has narrowed. So it’s reasonable to ask what has changed. But don’t kid yourself. The Republican Party has had conservative economic policies for more than 100 years, and a good percentage of lower-income Americans have been voting for them.
...................................................................................................................................................................