Women are still underrepresented in local government, despite a woman running for president

Will Kamala Harris’ candidacy inspire other women to run for office? Grant Baldwin/Getty Images by Justin de Benedictis-Kessner, Harvard Kennedy School Kamala Harris is at the top of a major party ticket running for president. Some people have celebrated her candidacy, hoping that it will excite voters enough to elect the first woman president. But the glass ceiling that stymied Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid in 2016 is still sturdy at other levels of political office across the country. My research with Diana Da In Lee, Yamil Velez and Chris Warshaw shows that in cities and counties, women remain underrepresented among local officeholders in nearly every political office. Like many other characteristics of officeholders, such as occupation or race, the gender of elected officials influences the way they make policy. Research has shown that women, and especially working-class women, elected to state and federal government offices in countries around the world make different spending decisions. Having more women in elected offices might matter especially at the local level, where the details of many of these federal or state spending decisions actually play out. Congress is infamous for having few women in office. But until now, researchers and the public knew very...