Gender or class – What determines voting? Lessons from expanding the suffrage in early 1900s Norway

Edda Torsdatter Solbakken ()
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Edda Torsdatter Solbakken: Statistics Norway, http://www.ssb.no/en/forskning/ansatte

Discussion Papers from Statistics Norway, Research Department

Abstract: Previous literature has found that extending the suffrage to both females and poorer voters increases the supply of public goods. This paper investigates whether the difference in voting between men and women can be explained by differences in income alone, or if there exist gender specific differences in preferences. I exploit two key features of the expansion of suffrage in municipality elections in early 20th century Norway. First, the time at which people gained the right to vote depended on both their gender and their household income. Second, the income threshold for suffrage was set nationally, creating variation across municipalities in the share of new voters following each extension of the suffrage. This variation allows me to estimate separate effects for the change in supply of health personnel following the extension of suffrage to poor men, rich women, and poor women, respectively. I find that the enfranchisement of both poor men and rich women increases the supply of doctors relative to when only rich men had the right to vote. These results are consistent with gender specific preferences for health services to the community.

Keywords: Enfranchisement; women’s suffrage; public goods; welfare state (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D72 H42 J16 N24 N44 P16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 35 pages
Date: 2022-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm, nep-hea, nep-his and nep-pol
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ssb:dispap:988

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