All mothers should be required to work

[Awsi Dooger]

Don't attack. This just goes along with a GD2004 thread today listing interesting statistics from 2000. I have dozens of those on Excel files.

One that jumped out at me at the time:

* Working mothers voted for Gore by a net 22%

* Stay-at-home moms voted for Bush by a net 24%

Makes me wonder if the so-called security moms aren't heavily the stay-at-home type who would have voted GOP regardless.

[clydefrand]

1. What is GD, please?

[K8-EEE]

2. General Discussion

Or, more stay-at-home moms like me should vote KERRY! AND VOLUNTEER!!!

[Big Kahuna]

3. In a civilized society, only one parent should have to work,

to support a simple, adequate existance for their family. Call me a commie.

[marlakay]

4. churches encourage moms to stay home so that figures

to me. I think the women who stay home because they want to not because of being told to are the kerry stay at home moms. so its not whether you work or not, I personally did both, stayed home 6 years then worked for last 20.

I still believe it goes back to church. But not really that, abortion and the churches that preach against it. Those are his base. I wonder if they have any idea both him and Laura are really pro choice if they were telling the truth.

[girl gone mad]

8. I agree that it has more to do with..

fundamentalists being more likely to be at home mothers than anything.

[annerevere]

14. I did the opposite, marlakay

I worked 25 years and am now at home with my two girls after a career as an academic (college prof).

It's getting more difficult to profile stay-at-home moms. So many are women who've left the work force a while, or plan to enter after raising their kids, or who like me, married and started a family quite late, and gave up a career for family reasons.

I've been home 6 years and haven't regretted it a minute.

[mzmolly]

5. I'm an at home Mom who is voting for Kerry, and have several such

friends. :hi:

[KittyWampus]

19. Mom's Staying At Home Isn't An Authentic Partisan Divide, IMO

LOTS of Moms would like to stay at home for at least the first few years.

It would be great if #1. Society worked it out economically for this to be feasible. #2. Staying home to tend your infant was more highly valued then having a career.

[Longhorn]

6. I'm an atheist and a Democrat and I was a stay-at-home mom

and proud of it. My sister is a Christian and a Republican and has worked nearly every minute of her life as a mother. I'm very skeptical of this generalization.

[DaveinMD]

9. and I'm a white male

More white males vote Republican than they do Democrat. THis doesn't apply to me, but that doesn't mean that demographically it isn't true.

[Longhorn]

16. Your sex and your race are determined at birth.

That's a more solid demographic than something such as the choice to be a parent, be in the workforce, and do both or do neither.

I understand that my two counterexamples don't disprove the generalization. I'm just saying that there are a lot of reasons why women have children and/or work that are due to education, financial support, geography, family dynamics, etc. So a statistic that links voting for a particular candidate and stay-at-home or working moms may be more a result of one of those other dynamics and just appear to be related to their parent/work status.

[Awsi Dooger]

17. Geez, DUers are always skeptical of the numbers I post

I use reliable sources, not internet wackos.

I just found my source of this stat, and other similar ones. It also said working women favored Gore by 19% and non-working women picked Bush by 8%. Notice that percentage changed very little amomg working women but considerably among non-working women, compared to working and stay at home moms. Non-working women without children obviously voted in favor of Gore, or at least much less support of Bush.

The file is available in PDF or html format. I will post the html version here for convenience. If anyone wants the PDF file, simply do a google search for "2000 vote for president Kenneth Goldstein." The PDF file will be the first listing. http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:YKgZD_9ZdZwJ:www.wpri.org/WIInterest/Vol10no1/Goldstein10.1.pdf+2000+vote+for+president+Kenneth+Goldstein&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

[Longhorn]

20. I'm sorry. I'm not blaming the messenger. I'm sure those are the

results that they got in the survey. I've just taken enough statistics that I know that there isn't always a causal relationship just because the numbers seem to point to one.

Keep posting those numbers and giving us something to think and talk about!

[Awsi Dooger]

24. Thank you, Longhorn. I will

I work in statistics, albeit sports related, and agree regarding the causal relationship, or lack thereof.

This stat stuck in my mind because I had not seen it before, and seldom is the difference in favoritism so dramatic. I thought DUers would like to pick it apart.

[Longhorn]

25. So what do your sports stats say about THE GAME tomorrow?

Texas vs. OU, of course! :D

Hook 'em, Horns!

[bloom]

7. Actually - one explanation

For a couple of "security moms" that I know ( by which I mean mothers who have fallen for the Republican fear propaganda) - they do work and have kids, one also takes care of an invalid family member... and they probably just get little sound bites of what is going on from FOX and or CNN.

They probably don't get alternate sources or have the time to investigate and sort things out.

I guess it could sound like I'm making excuses - but that is how I see it. They are not creepy, Stepford, or uneducated people. But they are not news junkies, either.

[captain disgruntled]

11. .

.

[captain disgruntled]

12. Because I am a stay-at-home Mom

...I have time to phone-bank for James Socas and John Kerry four days a week.

(thanks for the support, family!):hi:

[newyawker99]

26. Hi captain disgruntled!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[SheWhoMustBeObeyed]

10. All mothers DO work

At raising a family.

IMO, a woman's stay-at-home status is determined less by her religious affiliation and more by her husband's ability to support a family on one income. Wealthier people vote GOP.

[seabeyond]

13. i can see this a couple reasons,..............being a stay at home mom

firstly to afford to stay home, higher income more likely repug. also the female role per christian doctrine require women be stay at home

i dont fit, i have money and am older and dont have to horde. i like more to share and everyone rise up. i stay at hone, not because of role, but because i like to be with children and raise them myself and husband does fine so i can do the stuff here, then when he is home, he can relax. but i can see how this is.

also working mothers indicate probably more a need for money, single mothers, two working family to keep head above, they are going to tend more torwards the needed social programs

[seabeyond]

15. it is only a small percentage, certainly not saying all

also, no one had better be suggesting that the woman is smarter cause they go to work. i see a few on this thread alone that would challenge that, lol lol lol...........wink

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

18. they are

I know more stay at home moms who vote bush than working moms who vote bush, by quite a bit.

[Killarney]

21. I'm an athiest stay at home mom and a hardcore democrat

all my other stay at home mom friends are also all democrats, but then again I'm in Massachusetts.

[seaglass]

22. What about working moms who lost their job and are now

stay-at-home moms?

They are for Kerry :)

[LeftyMom]

23. stay at home stereotype

"Stay-at-home type"? WTF does that mean?

You'd probably assume I was one of "those" moms if you saw me headed back to the mommobile with an armload of homeschooling books and my youngest clinging to my long skirts (if he's not in the sling.) Little would you know! Yeah, I'm a work-at-home (I used to be a unpaid SAH) mom, and we homeschool but I sure as hell didn't vote for Bush.

If Gore didn't appeal to stay-at-home mothers, that sure as hell isn't our fault. Talk to stay-at-home moms and we talk about the high cost and low quality of medical care, food safety issues, car safety standards, the job market (if we aren't in it our partners are and we're screwed if they loose thier jobs,)the price of housing and tons of other issues that are tailor-made for liberal canidates. Really the only downside is the abortion isssue, and the hard core anti-choice crowd won't vote for pro-choice naidates no matter whaat work they do. The one thing stay-at-home moms have in common (and it isn't income, many of us are scraping by primarily due to our frugality) is that we want what's best for our kids and we'll bust our asses to give it to them. Talk about the future and how you'll make it beteter for our kids and we'll listen. Talk fast though, we're busy.