The Majority 2000 survey showed that, just after one's life partner, a person's political viewpoint is most often influenced by a parent of the same gender. Television and newspapers are the most important sources of media information in shaping the political views of women in all age groups. Issue opinions aside, the genders agree on which issues should be top priorities. Women and men actually assigned roughly the same priority to hot-button issues such as equal pay and abortion. And issues such as education, issues related to children and families and health care are in the top five on both His and Her lists.
Men do give different and significantly greater priority to the economy and taxation, however.
Of the 2,916 men surveyed, none identified this issue as most important. These responses verify that in this survey, as well as in many others, women as well as men regularly report better voting behavior than they actually exhibit. In other words, neither gender has cornered the market on civic duty. Inc. All rights reserved.