This just reminded me of my experience back in 1989-90 I think. A friend and I took a seminar in Montesquieu wirh a quite conservative politial philosophy prof. My friend was/is pretty far Left, and I was/am some weird combination of libertarian/anarchist with traditionalist leanings.
Anyway our entire grade depended on a paper of some 30 pages or so applying what we had learned from the thoughts of Montesquieu and our discussions. And we were both data geeks.
We focused on on the idea that political culture varied according to the average climate of a country.
My friend produced several graphs that demonstrated that the further north of the equator a country was the sooner women got the vote,, AND that the further north of the equator a country was the average consumption of alcohol increased. His conclusion was that the average climate led to heavier drinking in the north, and that drunken men were thus more likely to let women vote.
I used data to show the difference between the honey-production of honeybees versus bumblebees to show that honeybees were Socialists and bumblebees were Capitalists in their production and usage, and that the production depended on the latitude. Closer to the equator, more honeybees and excess honey production. The farther north of the equator more bumblebees that produce just enough honey to keep independent colonies thriving. (Bumblebees do produce honey, but they do not specialize on specific flowers as do individual honeybees, but gather nectar from whatever is available in a harsher climate, and store just enough to start again the next spring.)
That is, the gathering of nectar and the production of honey evolves bees with either Socialistic traits or Capitalist entrepeurnial trait.
Part of my argument was that Socialism tended to fail because it doesn't work well in colder climate countries which were also where capitalism and the industrial revolution started. and are basically still located.
The prof laughed and accused each of us with trying to be funny. (He was right.) But he also gave each of us an A for the actual parts that dealt with philosophy.
I had Gordon write this up for the first edition of my Encyclopedia. He was surprised that I wanted him to because he didn't have a good explanation. I told him that when someone like him is puzzled, it's worth writing up.
I suggest an alternative theory: female suffrage leads to the adoption of nanny-statist measures, in particular alcohol and drug bans or restrictions. In the US this was a pretty direct connection, because the suffragettes and the temperance movement were mostly the same people, even at their first appearances in 1850-70 (when a few states did ban alcohol).
This seems to me a good practical argument, even though unfair, for taking the vote away from women.
"The economic environment with which the husband was familiar was a marketplace. The economic environment the wife was familiar with was a tiny planned society with her as the planner." Presumably this explanation would predict that such differences would shrink over time as women have entered the labour force, and have smaller families. Maybe differences in higher education etc. might counter this, but at least qualitatively it doesn't seem to me that such differences have shrunk, which is what you would expect if it was sort of cultural based on the recent environment.
1) single women, rather then women in general, seem to be the biggest driver of the change. Single women marry the state. Life of Julia type stuff.
If you give religious married women the vote they don’t necessarily fall to the left of your average mid century socialist man. But fast forward to the 1970s and beyond and you’ve got a lot of single women far to the left.
2) a lot of people talk about growth of government only in the context of the federal government. Most growth in government especially in America since the 1960s has some at the state and local level.
When you hear “state and local” level think “teachers and nurses”.
Giving women the vote takes some time to move to the left because it takes awhile for women to change their familial and professional patterns to match their new political power. That is to say, before they figure out how to use their votes to get government to exploit people for their advantage.
Kirkegaard looked at some data relating stuff like educational attainment and number of kids, and support for bigger government, among men and women, also mentions 2 more studies after Lott's. (https://emilkirkegaard.dk/en/2019/12/women-taxes-and-voting/)
Was it George Bernard Shaw who predicted that women would be conservative voters? The thought was that women conserve resources in the home and are traditionalists at heart. But I agree with your argument that women are more apt to be statists than men. In any libertarian gathering, I am in the minority. One friend explained her differences by saying that she cared about the poor (and evidently I do not!) It's maddening. But the argument for women's leftist inclinations goes beyond her role as the central planner of her household. She's now in the workforce en masse, but is still shaking off the shackles of the wife-and-mother role, though some studies show she's not as happy now as she used to be. Many, especially the well-educated, view the Republican Party as much more likely to corral her.
Women were put off by the atheism and degeneracy of the socialist left 100 years ago, and so conservatives thought giving them the vote might help. There was also no sizeable single woman demographic.
Leftists were and are traditionally much more feminist than the right. There are multiple women who were extremist communists in Russia in the lead up to their revolution; as far as I know there weren't any extremist female reactionaries. If one political party supports women's rights, and the other doesn't, then women might be completely unbiased economically and still disproportionately support the leftist party.
She, Rand, and Isabel Paterson were nicknamed "the three Furies of libertarianism." Paterson ought to be included. Her The God of the Machine is a really interesting book.
You're taking the modern political divide between men and women, and projecting it to the past. Before the 90s and 2000s, men used to be more left wing than women.
Also most right wing people aren't libertarians, but conservative. Conservatism is not an ideology but simply status quo bias. This necessarily a bad thing. If it ain't broke, don't fix it and all that. So a highly agreeable section of the population would be expected to be more conservative then, you know, radical. In the past, women tended to be more religious (again agreeableness since most people inherit religious practices from their parents) which used to be a strongly associated with support for conservative parties.
Also the thing about the household and central planning doesn't make any sense. Women being in charge of the households are also responsible for buying daily necessities and hence more aware of market prices. They are obviously aware of their husband's salary.
The reason women have become liberal than men is because more young women go to college, and primarily study social sciences (has always been dominated by leftists) and medicine (a highly regulated industry dependent on government money).
Additionally the degree of political divergence is more aesthetic than operational. When polled on hot button political questions, the differences in opinion on policy isn't significant.
Also given that most criminals and homeless people tended to be men, wouldn't you expect women to be at least pro hard on crime politicians since they benefit disproportionately from it.
My instinct would be to make it a utilitarian preference.
Women historically tended to earn less and be dependent on men. One would expect they would tend to benefit more from an increase in government spending.
This just reminded me of my experience back in 1989-90 I think. A friend and I took a seminar in Montesquieu wirh a quite conservative politial philosophy prof. My friend was/is pretty far Left, and I was/am some weird combination of libertarian/anarchist with traditionalist leanings.
Anyway our entire grade depended on a paper of some 30 pages or so applying what we had learned from the thoughts of Montesquieu and our discussions. And we were both data geeks.
We focused on on the idea that political culture varied according to the average climate of a country.
My friend produced several graphs that demonstrated that the further north of the equator a country was the sooner women got the vote,, AND that the further north of the equator a country was the average consumption of alcohol increased. His conclusion was that the average climate led to heavier drinking in the north, and that drunken men were thus more likely to let women vote.
I used data to show the difference between the honey-production of honeybees versus bumblebees to show that honeybees were Socialists and bumblebees were Capitalists in their production and usage, and that the production depended on the latitude. Closer to the equator, more honeybees and excess honey production. The farther north of the equator more bumblebees that produce just enough honey to keep independent colonies thriving. (Bumblebees do produce honey, but they do not specialize on specific flowers as do individual honeybees, but gather nectar from whatever is available in a harsher climate, and store just enough to start again the next spring.)
That is, the gathering of nectar and the production of honey evolves bees with either Socialistic traits or Capitalist entrepeurnial trait.
Part of my argument was that Socialism tended to fail because it doesn't work well in colder climate countries which were also where capitalism and the industrial revolution started. and are basically still located.
The prof laughed and accused each of us with trying to be funny. (He was right.) But he also gave each of us an A for the actual parts that dealt with philosophy.
I had Gordon write this up for the first edition of my Encyclopedia. He was surprised that I wanted him to because he didn't have a good explanation. I told him that when someone like him is puzzled, it's worth writing up.
Here's the link: https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc1/GovernmentSpending.html
I suggest an alternative theory: female suffrage leads to the adoption of nanny-statist measures, in particular alcohol and drug bans or restrictions. In the US this was a pretty direct connection, because the suffragettes and the temperance movement were mostly the same people, even at their first appearances in 1850-70 (when a few states did ban alcohol).
This seems to me a good practical argument, even though unfair, for taking the vote away from women.
"The economic environment with which the husband was familiar was a marketplace. The economic environment the wife was familiar with was a tiny planned society with her as the planner." Presumably this explanation would predict that such differences would shrink over time as women have entered the labour force, and have smaller families. Maybe differences in higher education etc. might counter this, but at least qualitatively it doesn't seem to me that such differences have shrunk, which is what you would expect if it was sort of cultural based on the recent environment.
1) single women, rather then women in general, seem to be the biggest driver of the change. Single women marry the state. Life of Julia type stuff.
If you give religious married women the vote they don’t necessarily fall to the left of your average mid century socialist man. But fast forward to the 1970s and beyond and you’ve got a lot of single women far to the left.
2) a lot of people talk about growth of government only in the context of the federal government. Most growth in government especially in America since the 1960s has some at the state and local level.
When you hear “state and local” level think “teachers and nurses”.
Giving women the vote takes some time to move to the left because it takes awhile for women to change their familial and professional patterns to match their new political power. That is to say, before they figure out how to use their votes to get government to exploit people for their advantage.
If women tend to be more statist than men, that would explain why women are underrepresented in the libertarian movement.
Kirkegaard looked at some data relating stuff like educational attainment and number of kids, and support for bigger government, among men and women, also mentions 2 more studies after Lott's. (https://emilkirkegaard.dk/en/2019/12/women-taxes-and-voting/)
Was it George Bernard Shaw who predicted that women would be conservative voters? The thought was that women conserve resources in the home and are traditionalists at heart. But I agree with your argument that women are more apt to be statists than men. In any libertarian gathering, I am in the minority. One friend explained her differences by saying that she cared about the poor (and evidently I do not!) It's maddening. But the argument for women's leftist inclinations goes beyond her role as the central planner of her household. She's now in the workforce en masse, but is still shaking off the shackles of the wife-and-mother role, though some studies show she's not as happy now as she used to be. Many, especially the well-educated, view the Republican Party as much more likely to corral her.
Women were put off by the atheism and degeneracy of the socialist left 100 years ago, and so conservatives thought giving them the vote might help. There was also no sizeable single woman demographic.
Leftists were and are traditionally much more feminist than the right. There are multiple women who were extremist communists in Russia in the lead up to their revolution; as far as I know there weren't any extremist female reactionaries. If one political party supports women's rights, and the other doesn't, then women might be completely unbiased economically and still disproportionately support the leftist party.
Not exactly reactionary but Ayn Rand wasn’t particularly liberal.
But your example proves the point. How many authors like her can you name?
… hmmm … I’m thinking, I’m thinking…
Rose Wilder Lane.
She, Rand, and Isabel Paterson were nicknamed "the three Furies of libertarianism." Paterson ought to be included. Her The God of the Machine is a really interesting book.
Laura Ingalls Wilder’s daughter? Hmm… thanks David, this is interesting. More a fan of Arvo Halberg myself but I’m open minded.
I gather there is some evidence that she, not her mother, was the main author of the Little House books.
https://www.emilkirkegaard.com/p/women-taxes-and-voting
You're taking the modern political divide between men and women, and projecting it to the past. Before the 90s and 2000s, men used to be more left wing than women.
Also most right wing people aren't libertarians, but conservative. Conservatism is not an ideology but simply status quo bias. This necessarily a bad thing. If it ain't broke, don't fix it and all that. So a highly agreeable section of the population would be expected to be more conservative then, you know, radical. In the past, women tended to be more religious (again agreeableness since most people inherit religious practices from their parents) which used to be a strongly associated with support for conservative parties.
Also the thing about the household and central planning doesn't make any sense. Women being in charge of the households are also responsible for buying daily necessities and hence more aware of market prices. They are obviously aware of their husband's salary.
The reason women have become liberal than men is because more young women go to college, and primarily study social sciences (has always been dominated by leftists) and medicine (a highly regulated industry dependent on government money).
Additionally the degree of political divergence is more aesthetic than operational. When polled on hot button political questions, the differences in opinion on policy isn't significant.
Also given that most criminals and homeless people tended to be men, wouldn't you expect women to be at least pro hard on crime politicians since they benefit disproportionately from it.
Sorry. I meant to say status quo bias isn't necessarily a bad thing.
My instinct would be to make it a utilitarian preference.
Women historically tended to earn less and be dependent on men. One would expect they would tend to benefit more from an increase in government spending.
Oh how the Left is favoured by us having so few countries to prove data upon.
If the wife plans the life of the household, she also imposes the husband's choice of vote.