Politics, Polygamy and the GOP - a tentative theory about why there is a divide between men and women's voting tendencies

Spinster comes from a term used for a woman who spun wool. By some counts this was an occupation for a woman who couldn't get married. By other counts it was an occupation that freed women from having to get married. In any case, there was a connection between financial independence and being single.

Income changes the relationship between men and women and may explain some of politics in 2020.

Biden won in 2020 because of women. One, women voted for Biden by a margin of 15 points (men voted for Trump by a margin of 8 points). Two, women made up 52% of voters. Counting only the votes of men, Trump won by 6 million votes. Counting only the votes of women, Trump lost by 9 million - a swing of 15 million votes.

Why the huge disparity between men and women when it comes to politics? I'm sure there are lots of reasons but I'll throw out the possibility that it has to do with a big change in women working and how that has tracked with a change in marriage and relationships.

One bit of evidence I use to argue that everything is made up but the consequences are very real is this matter of monogamy and polygamy. Can you have only one wife, only one wife at a time or multiple wives? That is totally made up and varies across countries and time but the consequences are very real. All 20 of the 20 least stable countries in the world allow polygamy. As the Economist notes, "Polygamous societies are bloodier, more likely to invade their neighbours and more prone to collapse than others are." Why? "Every time a rich man takes an extra wife, another poor man must remain single. If the richest and most powerful 10% of men have, say, four wives each, the bottom 30% of men cannot marry. Young men will take desperate measures to avoid this state." 

Unmarried men behave differently than married men and societies that sentence a portion of their young men to remaining single suffer more violence because of it. Women have a moderating influence on men's cruder instincts.

In 1948 in the US, men were nearly 3X as likely to have a job as a woman. Today men are only 20% more likely. As women are less dependent on men for income, they also seem less inclined to marry. In 1950, 32% of men were unmarried; in 2020, 47% are.

How does that change politics?

It is possible that women domesticate men. If men - like dolphins - stayed apart from women except during a breeding season, they might still be living in caves and regaling each other with the story of that time poor Gog was trampled to death by a mastodon and had the funniest expression on his face. We talk a lot about bubbles and how folks on the left and right live in such different realities and know so little about each other. It's possible those bubbles increasingly include men in one world and women in another, two very different groups who may be influencing each other less and less.

It is a good thing that increasingly women have financial independence and choice about whether to marry. Progress means increased autonomy. All progress has unintended consequences, though, and perhaps one consequence of fewer women having to marry is fewer men benefitting from their influence.