Gender and Electoral Incentives: Evidence from Crisis Response

Juan Chauvin and Clemence Tricaud

No 17904, CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers

Abstract: This paper provides new evidence on why men and women leaders make different choices. We first use a simple political agency model to illustrate how voters' gender bias can lead reelection-seeking female politicians to undertake different policies. We then test the model's predictions by exploring leaders’ responses to COVID-19. Assuming that voters expect policies to be less effective if decided by women, the model predicts that female politicians undertake less containment effort than male politicians when voters perceive the threat as low, while the opposite is true when voters perceive it as serious. Exploiting Brazilian close elections, we find that, early in the pandemic, female mayors were less likely to close non-essential businesses and female-led municipalities experienced more deaths per capita, while the reverse was true later on, once the health consequences materialized. These results are exclusively driven by mayors facing reelection and stronger in municipalities with greater gender discrimination.

JEL-codes: D72 H11 J16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023-02
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Related works:
Working Paper: Gender and Electoral Incentives: Evidence from Crisis Response (2024)
Working Paper: Gender and Electoral Incentives: Evidence from Crisis Response (2022)
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