More than half (53%) of Americans say there are not enough women in high political offices, according to a recent Pew Research Center report. This is down six percentage points since 2018.
Fifty-two percent of Americans believe that in time, there will be equal gender representation. But there are several major reasons why women don’t hold these offices: “women have to do more to prove themselves than men” (54%), “gender discrimination” (47%), “many Americans are not ready to elect a woman to a higher office” (46%) and “family responsibilities” (44%).
The report finds that a small percentage (18%) of U.S. adults say it’s “extremely/very important” for a woman to be elected as president in their lifetime. However, most respondents (64%) say that it is “not at all/ not too important.”
Men (73%) more than women (57%) agree with this statement. Republican/Republican leaning respondents (86%) also agree more than Democrat/Democrat leaning respondents (43%) that electing a female president in their lifetime was “not at all/not too important.”
“Half or more say that a woman president would be neither better nor worse than a man or that a president’s gender doesn’t matter when it comes to their handling of various policy areas or to several leadership traits,” Juliana Menasce Horowitz and Isabel Goddard write. “Still, more than a third say a woman president would do better than a man when it comes to: handling education (46%), handling health care (45%), working out compromises (39%) (and) maintaining a respectful tone in politics (37%).”
To read the full report, click here.
Director of The Raceless Gospel Initiative, an associate editor, host of the Good Faith Media podcast, “The Raceless Gospel” and author of Take Me to the Water: The Raceless Gospel as Baptismal Pedagogy for a Desegregated Church.
