(Page 19 of 23) - Gendered Ambition? Career Choices of Staff Members in the U.S. House of Representatives authored by Jensen, Jennifer.

mixed support for the hypothesis that women facing sex discrimination would have lower levels
of political ambition. The sex discrimination variable is significant in the general ambition
models without the motivational variables, but once the motivational variables are included, this
effect disappears. The sex discrimination variable is not significant in any of the electoral
ambition models.

Though the ordered Probit models indicate that while these specific experiences of

women do not influence political ambition, the influence of gender on ambition more generally
is clear. My first hypothesis, that women are equally committed to their jobs but less ambitious
for higher-level positions, receives strong support. In two of three t-tests, women and men have
equal levels of commitment to success in political careers. Other t-tests indicate that though
women are also equally ambitious to move up in congressional staff positions, they are less
ambitious to move up in politics generally, or to achieve elective office. Furthermore, in all
regression models, gender has a statistically significant – but not uniform – negative effect.
Gender has a substantively powerful effect in the electoral ambition models, far more powerful
than in the first set of ambition models. It is not that women are less interested in running for
office than succeeding in politics in other ways. That would not be surprising. Most people who
get involved in politics do have a serious interest in running for office. It is that women working
in politics have an even lower interest in electoral politics than their male counterparts. These
models demonstrate a divide in levels of political ambition between men and women – a divide
that widens for electoral ambition.

The strength of the electoral ambition models indicate a measurement challenge that

political scientists face. It is easier to measure electoral ambition than a political ambition in a
more general sense. Perhaps the results of these models indicate that we have much work to do
in learning about the types of political ambitions that men and women have, and the different
ways that gender influences political ambition.

This paper tells us much about ambitions and career attitudes of congressional staff

members. I stated early in this paper that on the whole, satisfaction is high. Congressional jobs
are exciting and rewarding. Yet turnover on the Hill is historically high, and these survey results
indicate that even satisfied staff members say that they are likely to leave Congress in fewer than
three years. With regard to women, the descriptive results presented in Tables 2 and 3 indicate
chinks in the overall satisfaction that female staff members have with the House of
Representatives as a workplace. While there is no relationship between gender and likelihood of
leaving Congress within three years, there are significant reasons not to ignore gender equity as it
relates to satisfaction with the congressional workplace as well as career advancement. Perhaps
the difficulties women face help explain why women have climbed the congressional staff ladder
more slowly than men, though climb they have. Women seek a more inviting environment in
Congress, and such an environment could help retain women staff members. This is especially
true since women are not as driven to seek high salaries; only 38 percent of women expect to
make $120,000 or more at the peak of their careers, compared to 67 percent of the men. If
women are not as driven to leave by low salaries, then improvements in workplace environment
could make a significant difference in retention of professional staff members. Such
improvements would not only appeal to women; while men might be less affected by sex
discrimination, men would also benefit from family-friendly personnel policies. Improvements