A British study by Andrew Oswald and Nattavudh Powdthavee found that the more daughters you have, the more likely you are to vote for left-of-center parties. The reverse happens with sons.
Specifically: " For each daughter, holding family size constant, a parent is approximately 2 percentage points more likely to vote left."
Nathan Silver at fivethirtyeight.com has the link to the full study.
(I thank the mother of our two daughters and one son, all good Democrats, for finding this.)
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4 comments:
Interesting. This is totally new to me. My parents are liberal and so are my two brothers. I have an aunt and uncle who are conservative and have five daughters.
I would like to see the causal mechanism specified more. The research underlying this study assumes that "women's issues" simply are liberal, which I do not think is the case. These researchers hypothesize that single women are more pro-state, while single men want low taxes instead of state provision. It is still a leap, though, from that to why parents of women vs. men would change their political reasoning.
It may be that single women, especially those with children see big government as a husband replacement. One that makes no demands and expects nothing in return for care given. Womb to tomb, nanny government will care for us.
I have two daughters, no sons, and yet I find that I'm becoming more conservative -- well, reactionary actually -- as time goes on.
Of course, this could be the aging process.
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