CV NEWS FEED // An increasing number of women in the United States are becoming liberal in their political views, according to a recent Gallup survey.
The research center Gallup published the survey, noting broadly that U.S. citizens lean towards holding “center right” views. Approximately 36% of people identified as conservative, 25% as liberal, and the remaining 36% described themselves as “moderate.
The percentage of liberal-identifying citizens “is currently one percentage point shy of its all-time high,” while the “moderate” group simultaneously shrinks, Gallup wrote.
Gallup highlighted that “[increased] liberalism since the 1990s has occurred much more strongly among women of certain age groups, while men’s views have been steadier.”
Gallup’s recent findings are based on annual averages from the organization’s telephone surveys that interviewed some 12,000 people. For these 12,000, there were approximately “500 adults in each gender-by-age subgroup.”
Gallup noted an increase in women identifying as liberal from 1999 to 2021, but noted that women “[drew] back slightly from that position since then.”
“But the steepest increases in liberal [identification] occurred among women at either end of the age spectrum,” Gallup reported:
From 1999 to 2013, about three in 10 women aged 18 to 29 consistently identified as liberal, after which the figure rose (a bit unsteadily) to 44% by 2020. The percentage liberal receded slightly to 41% in 2022 and 40% in 2023.
The resulting 11-point increase in young women’s liberal identification since 1999 has made what was already the most liberal subgroup of women even more liberal.
In 1999, 14% of women aged 65 or older identified as liberal. By 2023, 25% of this age group identified as liberal. Eighteen percent of women aged 50 to 64 identified as liberal in 1999, and this percentage has since risen to 25% in 2023.
Women aged 30 to 49 have seen notable fluctuation in political views since 1999. In 1999, 22% of women aged 30 to 49 identified as liberal, and by 2023, 28% of women in this age group identified as such. In 2018, however, 36% of women in this age group identified as liberal, so there was an 8% decline in the past five years.
“From 1999 to 2016, women aged 18 to 29 were most likely to identify as politically moderate, even as the percentage identifying as liberal was gradually rising,” Gallup reported:
Between 2017 and 2019, the groups were represented nearly equally among young women, after which the liberal share became the plurality.
Conservatism has mostly declined among 20-something women since about 2012. However, after reaching an all-time low of 16% in 2020 and 2021, the share of this group identifying as conservative has risen back to 21%.
That still represents a decline in conservatism among young women over the long term, while their liberal identity has expanded.
Gallup noted that political views for men “have either become slightly more liberal (as seen with the 30-to-49 and 65-and-older age groups) or haven’t changed (as with adults aged 18 to 29 and 50 to 64).”
For men ages 50 to 64, their political views “have been predominantly conservative over time, although never at the majority level. Moderates consistently rank second among this group, while liberals have ranked third at a much lower level,” Gallup reported:
…Men in the 30-to-49 age range have, over time, shown the most affinity for the conservative and moderate labels, and in roughly equal measure, while a smaller segment has identified as liberal.
However, the liberal share of 30- to 49-year-old men is five points higher today than in 1999, while the percentages [of] moderate and conservative have each declined slightly.
