Women in Congress

[Padfoot]

I recently read somewhere (can't remember where, sorry) that at the present rate it will take women approximately another 100 years to achieve an even 50-50 gender split in Congress.  Since the '92 "Year of the Women" when female membership in Congress shot up from 33 members to 55 we have not really been electing that many new women to Congress.  The biggest jump up since '92 was '04 when the number of women increased by 9. 

It will be interesting to see if the replacement of Baby Boomers with Millennials yields another major increase.  So far not so much.  Women make up only 15.2% of the House members in their 30s but they make up 36.6% of the House members in their 70s or older.  I would imagine it is probably more difficult for women to start a political career in their 30s if they have kids.  Also they live longer so one might expect there to be a greater percentage of women amongst older members due to the guys dying off sooner.