Exploring Young Women's Leftward Expansion

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

50% : The analysis also looks at whether the increasing proportion of women enrolled in higher education relative to men explains the recent surge in young women's identification as politically liberal.
45% : Meanwhile, young women have become 10 to 15 percentage points more likely to embrace the liberal-leaning positions on questions about the death penalty, doctor-assisted suicide, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the legalization of marijuana, the government's role in guaranteeing healthcare coverage for all, their overall abortion stance, support for labor unions, immigration levels and the legality of same-sex marriage.
45% : Similar to the trends among young men, young women have been less concerned in recent years than in 2008-2016 about Social Security, energy, unemployment, the federal deficit and the economy.
40% : At the same time, their concern about drug use, healthcare, illegal immigration and terrorism hasn't changed, while they harbor less concern about crime, Social Security, energy supplies, and several aspects of the economy.
33% : Young women's views have shifted to the left, but by less than 10 points, on corporate and upper-income taxes, business regulation, prioritizing the environment over energy production, the moral acceptability of embryonic stem-cell research, defense spending, support for an independent Palestinian state and banning handguns between the Obama era and Trump/Biden periods.
25% : Since then, the country has experienced Trump's first year in office in 2017, during which the #MeToo movement against sexual abuse gained prominence; a record number of women being seated in Congress in 2019; the 2020 coronavirus pandemic and presidential election; the overturning of Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court in 2022; and another presidential election featuring Trump, in 2024.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.