A new study shows women are more likely to identify as liberal now than at any time in the past two decades.
That trend puts them squarely at odds with young men, though.
According to Gallup Poll data analyzed by the Survey Center on American Life, 44% of young women between the ages of 18 and 29 counted themselves liberal in 2021, compared to 25% of young men.
The gender gap is the largest recorded in 24 years of polling.
A decade ago, roughly 30% of young women and 27% of young men identified as liberal, according to the Survey Center.
"I think there is a big generational shift that happened with Generation Z women who were really coming of age in the last five years," Kelsy Kretschmer, a sociologist at Oregon State University, told The Hill.
Analysts say several forces have pushed young women to the left in recent years, including the #MeToo movement, former President Donald Trump, rising LGBTQ identification and, most recently, abortion policy.
"These changes are also reflected in the diverging views about societal change," Survey Center noted. "Young women stand out for their support for changing social norms in American society, including more women serving in the military, more children having gay or lesbian parents, and more men staying home with children."
The Survey Center also noted that women's political preferences have shifted significantly over the past couple of decades, with a majority of women now identifying with or leaning toward the Democratic Party.
"Putting off marriage, going to college, entering the workforce, women are doing that at much higher rates than they used to," Marc Hetherington, a professor of political science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, told The Hill. "And all of those things are going to make conservatism and the Republicans significantly less attractive to women."
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