Pensioners active voters in the elections to the European Parliament 2024

Data on votes cast

The data on voting presented in the text are obtained from data on votes cast which are based on entries in the electronic voting register. The data on votes cast are useful especially when examining differences in the voting turnout of separate groups. These data are not available from other register data.

The examination covers persons entitled to vote in the elections to the European Parliament 2024, advance voters in the whole country and all who voted in such municipalities and voting districts where an electronic voting register was used on the election day. The examined voter groups are separate but partly overlapping. The following terms are used for the voter groups in the text, tables and figures:

Group 1. All persons who voted in advance in the elections in the whole country

Group 2. Advance voters and persons who voted on the election day in the voting districts that used an electronic voting register.

There were 4,293,213 persons entitled to vote resident in Finland in the elections to the European Parliament 2024. Of these persons entitled to vote, 1,095,109, i.e. 25.5 per cent, voted in advance. The voting districts where data on voting on the actual election day were available comprised 2,450,403 persons entitled to vote. Data containing voting on the election day were received about 57.1 per cent of persons entitled to vote.

An electronic voting register is necessary for examining voting turnout on the election day. Data on voting on the election day were available from 213 municipalities. Data were available for all voting districts from 165 municipalities. Data were available for some voting districts from 48 municipalities.

The voting districts and municipalities where an electronic register was used are not divided evenly on the level of the whole country. The most exhaustive data from constituencies were available from the constituency of Central Finland, on 93.0 per cent of persons entitled to vote. The coverage was weakest in the constituency of Helsinki, where data were available from two voting districts, covering 1.3 per cent of persons entitled to vote in the constituency.

In the areas with an electronic voting register, persons entitled to vote do not differ much from all persons entitled to vote in terms of the key socio-economic background factors. Differences in the age, sex, main type of activity and language of persons entitled to vote are marginal between the areas and the whole country. The difference is biggest in the educational structure of the groups. There are slightly fewer people (2.1 percentage points) with at least master's or equivalent degree in the areas than in the whole country.

Interpretation of data on votes cast

The number of voters based on data on votes cast is not exactly the same as in the result data of the elections. There may be small differences by area in the numbers of voters extracted from different sources. This is because the number of those who voted in the election result data is based on ballots, while the data on votes cast are based on entries made in the electronic voting register on those who voted.

Differences may arise, for example, because of the following reasons: 1) a certain vote cast in advance voting is not taken into account on the basis of the Election Act, 2) an advance vote is not received before the deadline, 3) possible procedural errors on the day of the election, e.g. a voter has not left a ballot or two ballots clinging together were given to a voter, or 4) different recording errors. These random factors are not corrected in the data on votes cast.

The exact number of persons who voted or voting percentage in the elections cannot be extracted specifically at summary levels from the database tables concerning data on votes cast. The numbers of persons who voted presented in the tables describe the entries in the voting register. It is impossible to correct possible erroneous entries afterwards.

The significant differences in voting turnout between constituencies also impact the figures. The voting percentage was highest in the constituency of Helsinki (56.0%), which was 15.4 percentage points higher than the voting turnout in the rest of the country. The difference in voting turnout in Helsinki and the rest of the country combined with the low coverage of voting data in Helsinki on the election day impacts the difference in the voting percentage between the data on votes cast and the election result data.

Voting turnout among young men was low

In the voting districts from which all voting data were available, 40.1 per cent of persons entitled to vote cast their vote. As mentioned, the exceptionally large difference to the voting percentage among persons resident in Finland (-2.3 percentage points) is, on one hand, explained by the higher voting percentage in Helsinki than in the rest of the country and, on the other hand, by a clearly weaker coverage of data than in the rest of the country.

Votes cast by age group and sex in the European Parliament elections 2024

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Women voted more actively than men both in advance in the whole country as well as among all who voted in the areas. In the areas, 41.5 per cent of women voted, the difference to men was 2.9 percentage points. Men's voting turnout exceeded women's in the age group of those aged 70 or over. Among age groups, voting turnout in the areas was lowest for men aged 20 to 24, altogether 17.2 per cent.

Voting is more common in higher income brackets

The income level of those who voted and those entitled to vote is examined with the help of disposable monetary income. Income data derive from the latest confirmed taxation from 2022. Disposable monetary income refers to monetary income after taxes. This consist of earned income, property income, benefits in kind and transfer income.

The income of persons entitled to vote is divided into quintiles. Quintiles are derived by arranging persons entitled to vote by income and by dividing the group into five equal parts. The groups formed in this way include around 857,000 persons entitled to vote of all persons entitled to vote in the whole country. In the areas from which data were received on voting on the election day as well, the groups formed in this way included around 489,000 persons entitled to vote.

On the level of the whole country, income data are missing for approximately 7,800 persons entitled to vote. In the data for the areas containing election day votes, income data were missing for some 3,200 persons entitled to vote. The median for the disposable monetary income of all persons entitled to vote was around EUR 24,400 per year. In the examined areas, the corresponding median income was about EUR 24,000.

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The effect of income on voting turnout was clear for all who voted. As a rule, voting was more common in higher income brackets than in lower income brackets. Over 50 per cent of those entitled to vote belonging to the highest income quintile voted. In the lowest quintile, voting turnout was slightly over 30 per cent. Thus, the difference in voting turnout between the lowest and highest income quintiles was over 23 percentage points.

Highly educated and employed persons are active voters

Persons entitled to vote with lowest tertiary or higher level of education voted more often than average. The voting percentage of persons with master's or doctoral level education was 29.9 percentage points higher than that of all persons entitled to vote and 42.8 percentage points higher than that of persons with basic level education.

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Lowest tertiary level qualifications decrease in the population and no new qualifications are completed in Finland in this category, so the age structure of the educational group differs clearly from other groups. Lowest tertiary level education covers qualifications above upper secondary level that are not university of applied sciences degrees.

In groups of main type of activity, advance voting was most common among pensioners. Altogether 36.8 per cent of pensioners voted in advance. In other groups of main type of activity, the share of advance voters was relatively smaller than among all persons entitled to vote.

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Pensioners were the most active voters in the areas, too. Of pensioners, 48.6 per cent voted in the elections. In all other groups of main type of activity, voting turnout was below the level of all persons entitled to vote. Those in the inactive population had the lowest voting turnout, 23.2 per cent, among those whose main type of activity was known.

Voting turnout of persons with foreign background was low

In all, 40.1 per cent of Finnish and Sami speakers voted. Among the examined language groups, Swedish speakers had the highest voting turnout, over 50 per cent. By contrast, the voting turnout of foreign-language speakers was low, below 18 per cent.

Votes cast by origin and language in the European Parliament elections 2024

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The examination by origin does not change the picture formed based on language groups. The difference in voting turnout between persons of Finnish background and those of foreign background was 22.6 percentage points.