The Consequences of Educational Expansion for the Gender Vote Gap: A Comparative Study of Western Countries

Educational expansion is increasing the share of educated voters in Western electorates, but educated women are often found to be more left-wing than educated men. This was evident in the 2016 US election, where a majority of white women with a college degree voted for Clinton, whilst a majority of white men with a college degree voted for Trump. Using the European Values Study and World Values Survey, this paper investigates the extent to which this gender gap is seen across other Western countries, and tests possible reasons for such a gender gap. Potential explanations include: gender differences in economic position at higher levels of education, since women receive lower economic benefits from higher education than men but still take on more caring responsibilities; educated women may be more feminist than educated men; and educated women may be concentrated in particular occupations which are more left-leaning than the kinds of occupations educated men are found in. The size of the gender gap is also expected to vary cross-nationally according to the extent of educational expansion, gender inequalities in the workforce, and welfare regimes. This research contributes to the current literature on political gender gaps, especially in a context where women are noted as becoming more left-wing than men in general. It also has implications for electoral politics, pointing to the existence of a previously unconsidered cleavage interaction between education and gender, and suggests that where the traditional base of support for social democratic parties, such as the manual working class, is declining, a new source of support is emerging in the form of a growing group of educated, left-wing women. This in turn has consequences for social policy and the future of welfare states.