Will She Stay or Will She Go? Career Ceilings and Women's Retirement from the U.S. Congress

Lawless, Jennifer L.; Theriault, Sean M.

doi:10.3162/036298005x201680

Cited by 30 publications

(36 citation statements)

References 30 publications

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“…Women are also more likely than men to depart from Congress prematurely when they hit a "career ceiling" and can no longer affect the legislative agenda. And the women who depart voluntarily from Congress are less likely than similarly situated men to seek higher office (Lawless and Theriault 2005).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Uncovering the Origins of the Gender Gap in Political Ambition

2014

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women and men who work in the professions from which most candidates for elective office emergereveal a striking gender gap in political ambition (Lawless and Fox 2012;. Women are less likely than similarly situated men to consider running for office; less likely to run for office; less like to believe they are qualified to seek office; less likely to receive encouragement to run for office; and more likely to perceive a competitive, biased electoral environment (see also Fulton et al. 2006).Although the existing work on candidate emergence identifies and explicates the contours of the gender gap in political ambition among well-established potential candidates, virtually no political science research examines its origins (but see Elder 2004). We are very limited in the conclusions we can draw about the roots of the gap or the manner in which early life experiences shape it. This omission in the literature is critical because a general interest in, or openness toward, running for office early in life can set the stage for a political candidacy decades later. Young people's career goals, after all, tend to be excellent predictors of the occupations they ultimately attain (Ashby and Schoon 2010;Mello 2008;Trice and McClellan 1993). Many gendered attitudes about running for office, then, may result from deeply embedded socialized norms that are conveyed long before women and men find themselves in the candidate eligibility pool. Yet we simply do not know when young women and men's political ambition diverges, the extent to which it does so, or the factors that contribute to it. If the seeds of political ambition are planted at an early age, then gaining a complete understanding of the gender gap in ambition and prospects for women's representation demands that we pinpoint and explicate its origins.This article provides the first investigation to do just that. Based on survey responses from a national random sample of nearly 4,000 high school (ages 13 to 17) and college (ages 18 to 25) students, we uncover a substantial gender gap in political ambition. This is striking evidence that the gap is, in fact, present well before women and men enter the professions from which most candidates emerge. We then employ 499 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Uncovering the Origins of the Gender Gap in Political Ambition

2014

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“…Fulton et al 2006), political ambition here is implicitly defined in terms of progressive ambition. Lawless and Theriault (2005) demonstrate that both men and women often reach career ceilings, but while males either tend to stick around because they get satisfaction from merely serving in Congress, or decide to run for higher office because of their (progressive) ambition (cf. Fox 1997), women usually prefer to retire.…”

Section: Understanding Female Representation In the Us Congressmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Career Length and Service of Female Policymakers in the US House of Representatives

Praino¹,

Stockemer

2016

Gov. & oppos.

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Various studies have outlined the institutional (e.g. the existence of quota laws and the electoral system type of a country) and non-institutional factors (e.g. the political culture of a country) that account for variation in women’s representation, in general, and, in more detail, the low representation of women in the US Congress. However, no study has, so far, compared the Congressional career paths of men and women in order to understand whether this gender gap in representation stems from a difference in terms of the duration and importance of the careers of male and female policymakers. Using data on all US House elections between 1972 and 2012, we provide such an analysis, evaluating whether or not the political careers of women in the US House of Representatives are different from the political careers of their male counterparts. Our findings indicate that the congressional careers of men and women are alike and, if anything, women may even have a small edge over their male colleagues.

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“…Barring such circumstances, representatives are not supposed to want to retire (Hibbing, 1982) unless retirement will allow for progressive ambition (Grofman, Griffin, and Berry, 1995;Herrick and Moore, 1993;Hibbing, 1986;Schlesinger, 1966). Aside from electoral concerns, the reasoning behind retirement is generally attributed to one of several factors, including personal concerns such as age, health problems, or other circumstances that may preclude a representative from continuing in office for another term (Brace, 1985;Cooper and West, 1981;Fukumoto, 2009;Hibbing, 1982;Lawless and Theriault, 2005), political career ambition (Bullock, 1972;Fisher and Herrick, 2002;Theriault, 1998), or limitations of their current institutional standing (Lawless and Theriault, 2005).…”

Section: Severing the Electoral Bondsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Legislators Off Their Leash: Cognitive Shirking and Impending Retirement in the U.S. House*

Romano

2018

Social Science Quarterly

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Objective This article investigates whether public officials exhibit “cognitive shirking” prior to announcing retirement by changing the way they communicate during their final term. Method I analyze monthly speeches made by members of the U.S. House between the 105th and 109th terms, and collect data on psychological indicators found to indicate changes in cognition. A mixed effect logistic regression examines whether these indicators increase the probability of retirement before the end of the term. Results The probability of retirement is amplified by increases in the level of cognitive inconsistency they display in public speeches. Conclusion Public officials, when deciding whether to retire from politics, display patterns of shifting priorities before and after making their retirement announcement. This suggests that representatives’ justifications for policy choices go through significant reorganization as the electoral connection is severed.

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Will She Stay or Will She Go? Career Ceilings and Women's Retirement from the U.S. Congress

Cited by 30 publications

References 30 publications

Uncovering the Origins of the Gender Gap in Political Ambition

Uncovering the Origins of the Gender Gap in Political Ambition

The Career Length and Service of Female Policymakers in the US House of Representatives

Legislators Off Their Leash: Cognitive Shirking and Impending Retirement in the U.S. House*

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