Where Are the Young Men Leaving Yoon Going...

Significant Shift Away from Yoon Seok-yeol in a Month
Conflict with Party Leader and Disappointment in Gender Awareness
Mass Movement to Lee Jae-myung and Ahn Cheol-soo

[Asia Economy Reporter Oh Ju-yeon] Among the 2030 generation, the group showing the most prominent 'anti-Yoon Seok-yeol' phenomenon in the past month is analyzed to be men in their 20s. This appears to reflect disappointment over conflicts with Representative Lee Jun-seok and the gender awareness shown in the recruitment of Shin Ji-ye.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

On the 6th, Asia Economy analyzed data from three organizations (Realmeter, Kantar Korea, Research View) that published polls this year, which included age and gender breakdowns, conducted at the end of November and December last year. It confirmed that among the 2030 youth, the votes of men in their 20s largely shifted from candidate Yoon Seok-yeol to candidates Lee Jae-myung and Ahn Cheol-soo.

When comparing the presidential candidate support rate trends from a month ago by dividing into four groups?men and women in their 20s and men and women in their 30s?men in their 20s showed a double-digit drop in support for candidate Yoon across all three organizations, with a significantly larger decline than other groups (20s women, 30s men and women).

In the Kantar Korea survey (November 28?30 and December 27?29, 2021; 95% confidence level with ±3.1 percentage points), support for candidate Yoon among men in their 20s dropped from 29.9% to 15.8%, a 14.1 percentage point decrease. This contrasts with other groups, which showed differences within the margin of error of 3 percentage points.

The Realmeter survey (November 29?December 3 and December 26?31, 2021; 95% confidence level with ±1.8 percentage points) showed a similar trend. Support for candidate Yoon among men in their 20s fell from 44.3% to 25.0%, a 19.3 percentage point drop. Meanwhile, candidates Lee Jae-myung (25.7%→38.3% (12.6 percentage points▲)) and Ahn Cheol-soo (9.6%→15.3% (5.7 percentage points▲)) made notable gains.

The Research View survey (internal survey November 27?30 and December 28?31, 2021; 95% confidence level with ±3.1 percentage points) also found that the decline in support for candidate Yoon among men in their 20s (51.0%→30.0% (21.0 percentage points▼)) shifted to candidates Lee Jae-myung (30.0%→35.0%) and Ahn Cheol-soo (8.0%→20.0%).

The reason candidate Yoon lost votes particularly among men in their 20s within the 2030 generation is analyzed to be mainly due to conflicts with Representative Lee, who had high support from this group, and the failure to sensitively respond to the 'reverse discrimination' issue that 20s men were dissatisfied with, as well as recruiting feminist Shin Ji-ye. Um Kyung-young, director of the Era Spirit Research Institute, said, "Due to the pro-feminist strategy, the defection of men in their 20s was significant, and the approval rating was greatly damaged," adding, "However, since the confrontation with Representative Lee seems to be ongoing, it may be difficult to easily recover the approval rating."

For detailed information related to the polls, please refer to the Central Election Poll Deliberation Commission website.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.