Gender and economic voting, revisited

In this article, I focus on the extent to which gender structures economic voting in presidential elections from 1980 to 2004. Existing literature suggests that women and men rely on sociotropic and pocketbook considerations to differing degrees. The overriding view is that women vote more sociotropically than men and men vote more egocentrically than women. Contrary to conclusions drawn by scholars and cited by subsequent researchers, I find that men and women alike vote sociotropically – and to essentially the same degree. There is no evidence to suggest that women vote more sociotropically than men. Moreover, pocketbook voting is hard to find – among both men and women. The evidence overall suggests more similarity than difference in women and men's economic voting.