Why you think the democratic party lost so much? Are voters rational actors in times like this? What will change? What will not change?
Democrats lost control of the House in this 2010 mid-term election, however they still hold control of the Senate by a slim majority of 53 to 46 seats. Even though the Democrat's won the majority in the Senate, they still lost a net of 6 seats to the Republican party.
In the House, the Democrats lost a whopping 60 seats to the Republicans.
There isn't a correlation between employment figures and voting behavior. For instance, Democrats lost bids for re-election in Arkansas and Wisconsin. The current unemployment rate is 7.8% in Arkansas and 8.5% in Wisconsin. In both of these states, the unemployment rates went down within the year. Both of these states had a party change to Republican as well.
Democrats also lost seats held by retiring Democrats in North Dakota (3.8%), Pennsylvania (9%), and Indiana (10%), as well as a seat in Illinois (11.2%), which was once held by President Barrack Obama. The unemployment rate in all of these states went down except Illinois which went up 1% within the year. All of these states had a party change to Republican as well.
Democrats, however, are taking the lead in the races in Connecticut (9%) and Minnesota (7.2%).
Unemployment rates initially don't seem to have an effect on voting behavior because there are only small differences in numbers between those states that voted Democrat and those that voted Republican. However, one could argue that there has always been a direct correlation between unemployment rates and performance in midterm elections.
Either way, voters are probably not rational in times like these. People want jobs and will vote for the party that will supply them.
