Politico Op-Ed finds that what women want is not a mystery- "Women want an investment in economic security for themselves and their families." Budget cuts proposed by both Republicans and Democrats will disproportionately hurt women. Kuriansky and Lake suggest that women's "votes will continue to remain up for grabs" as we approach 2012.
Monday, April 4, 2011
What Do Women Really Want?
Politico Op-Ed finds that what women want is not a mystery- "Women want an investment in economic security for themselves and their families." Budget cuts proposed by both Republicans and Democrats will disproportionately hurt women. Kuriansky and Lake suggest that women's "votes will continue to remain up for grabs" as we approach 2012.
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4 comments:
Julia and I are not fans of Mel, but I thought it was appropriate
I feel like this article fails to demonstrate a real understanding of women's voting behavior. Women, at least today, are not a single, unified voting bloc. They all care about very different issues. For instance, married stay at homes moms are almost always Republicans (and value many of the things a stereotypical republican would value). A working, single mother however has completely different values. The article also overlooks Women as parts of society. It assigns what Americans want to what Women want. The only useful polling data lies in comparisons between men and women, and even that does not translate into votes for one party or the other. Most Americans are in favor of the provisions in the Healthcare bill, yet remain opposed to the Healthcare bill. In my opinion, the few statistics that the author uses to show a difference between men and women have no real impact on voting behavior, which is influenced primarily by party. I realize that there are a greater percentage of women registered in the Democratic Party, but the important thing is to look at why they are Democrats. It is usually because of outside factors (teachers, recipients of government aid) and not because women (as a whole) are predisposed to the Democratic Party. So, what do women want? Depends on the woman, which makes them such an enigma.
Problem with trying to pigeonhole women’s political preferences: http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/nation/polls/2004-08-25-female-vote_x.htm
I agree with you Ian - it is a short op-ed and does make a lot of generalizations about women in failing to acknowledge variations between women's values, and careers. However, I still found the statistics comparison between men and women's views toward the economy to be interesting.
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