Percentage Clinton voters, percentage Trump voters
Data for the number of votes for Clinton and Trump come from Politico and the New York Times and are current as of November 23, except for nine counties in California, which were updated November 29 to reflect new counts. Percentages are calculated as the number of Trump or Clinton voters divided by the total presidential votes for the county. County-level data on voting for Alaska were not available, so the percentages for Alaska counties reflect the percentages for the entire state. All data from Politico and the New York Times were copied by hand; no automated methods were used.
Average credit score, percentage with subprime credit score, and percentage with debt in collections
Data on credit characteristics come from the Urban Institute’s database consisting of a nationally representative sample of data on more than five million consumers obtained from a major credit bureau. Data were collapsed at the county level. For the 4 percent of records missing county identification, county was assigned based on the city or zip code of residence. Counties with fewer than 50 observations in the credit bureau data were excluded.
Median household income, income inequality, percentage over age 25 with a bachelor’s degree or higher, percentage white, percentage black, percentage Hispanic, and homeownership rate
These data come from the American Community Survey. We start with data from the 2015 American Community Survey, which was available for approximately one quarter of counties but was suppressed for counties that did not have a sufficient sample size. For counties without sufficient population to be included in the one-year 2015 American Community Survey estimates, data from the 2010–14 five-year average were used. These data were accessed using the National Historical Geographic Information System.
Unemployment rate
Data on county-level unemployment come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Local Area Unemployment Statistics and are the 2015 annual averages.