We are slowly but surely seeing an increase in representation for women in our government and low-making institutions. Women will hold 135 seats in the 117th Congress. While this may seem like a lot of seats or a lot of progress, this number of seats only makes up one-quarter of the total 535 seats in the U.S. Congress. 111 of these seats are women in the House of Representatives and 24 of these seats are women in the Senate (which is 2 fewer women than last year's Senate). In other good news, the number of women who ran for candidacy has increased. Over 300 women ran as party nominees for Congress, more than ever before. Lastly, the number of women of color and women from minority groups being elected to Congress has increased as well. I'm not sure if there is a correlation or if it is purely coincidence, but the majority of the women elected as Senate and House representatives identify as democrats.
To echo my previous posts, this is a step in the right direction for equality and equal representation, but there is still a long way to go. With only one-quarter of Congress being women representatives when women make up over half of the U.S. population is inequitable. I believe that Senate and House representatives should be proportional to the population of the United States in gender and race. I hope that we will see this gap in representation close sooner rather than later.
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Hi, I agree with you, since women are half of the population, we should be represented in our government proportionally. I think this is a really good post that provided facts on the current standing of our legislative branch. I find it inspiring that more women are running for congress. I also found it really interesting that you said that most women representatives are democratic. I think this is a really good post that will make people think.
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