Remember that Demo members rejected the Obama administration’s proposal to reduce the charitable deduction for high earners—a clear attempt to channel money away from the voluntary nonprofit sector and to the government public sector. Now Reps. Mike Quigley and Jared Polis are arguing against Obama’s proposal to treat carried interest as ordinary income rather than capital gains; they say it would hurt the real estate market and entrepreneurship. Chuck Schumer “will not stand” for this provision. Democrats Mary Landrieu and Mark Begich are against eliminating the so-called loopholes for oil companies. Senate voted 94-3 against reducing charitable deductions in April 2009.
I recall reading in the coverage of today’s special election in the New York 9th district that the district has the highest Jewish percentage of population of any congressional district. The fact is that no one knows for sure. The Census Bureau doesn’t ask people about their religions, and political polls cannot be trusted to give us precise percentages of adherents to particular religions. Here are the North American Jewish Data Bank’s estimates of the Jewish populations of congressional districts in 2000 and 2006. These should be regarded, I think, as having a pretty wide margin of error. Areas with large Jewish percentages are almost all parts of large metropolitan areas, where congressional district boundaries tend to be convoluted. By their measure, New York 9 had the fourth highest Jewish population of any district in 2006, after Florida 19, New York 8 and California 30. But note that we’re talking here about total numbers, not percentages. Congressional districts within a given state tended to have equal populations as measured by the 2000 Census, but there was still some difference between districts in different states, and population growth or decline since 2000 has made the populations of districts more unequal.
My best guess is that the population of New York 9 is about one-quarter Jewish, but that about one-third of those who vote today will be Jewish; the latter figure seems in line with recent polling. Note that no district in the country has a majority-Jewish population.
