Hani Mansour

Gender differences in political career progression

This is the title of a paper by Hani Mansour (joint with Ryan Brown, Stephen O’Connell and James Reeves) using evidence from US elections. The study establishes and investigates a substantial gender gap in the career progression of local female politicians in the US. Using data on the career trajectories of the near-universe of candidates for US state legislatures since the 1960s, the authors show that winning an additional term in the state legislature increases the probability of ever running for Congress by two percentage points for women, but six percentage points for men. This gender gap in career progression starts early in legislators’ careers and widens over time. Instead of competing in Congressional elections, local female legislators are more likely to re-contest state legislature seats than men. The authors show that this differential return to winning an additional term in the state legislature is not generated by gender differences in previously accumulated political experience, educational credentials, political party affiliation, or constituency characteristics.

In addition to revising this paper, Mr. Mansour will work on an additional project entitled “Casualties, Prejudice, and Labor Market Outcomes among Muslims and Arabs in the US” (joint with Kerwin Charles, Daniel Rees, Bryson Rintala, and Konstantin Kunze) in which they investigate how war fatalities in Iraq and Afghanistan impacted prejudice against Muslims and Arabs residing in the US.

Hani Mansour's research lies at the intersection of labor economics, development economics, and the economics of gender. Currently, he is studying the labor market impacts of US immigration enforcement policies, the career trajectories of female politicians in both India and the US, and the long-term labor market effects of exposure to female STEM professors.

Hani Mansour is an Associate Professor in the Department of Economics at the University of Colorado, Denver. He received his PhD from the University of California at Santa Barbara in 2009. His articles have been published in leading economics journals, such as the Review of Economics and Statistics, The Journal of Labor Economics, Economic Journal, and the Journal of Human Resources. Mr. Mansour is an IZA Research Fellow and an Associate Editor of the Journal of Population Economics.