Gender Differences in Cooperative Environments? Evidence from the U.S. Congress

Abstract

This paper uses data on bill cosponsorship in the U.S. House of Representatives to estimate gender differences in cooperative behaviour. We find that among Democrats there is no significant gender gap in the number of cosponsors recruited, but women-sponsored bills tend to have fewer cosponsors from the opposite party. On the other hand, we find robust evidence that Republican women recruit more cosponsors and attract more bipartisan support on the bills that they sponsor. We interpret these results as evidence that cooperation is mostly driven by a commonality of interest, rather than gender per se.