❓WHAT HAPPENED: A Gallup survey revealed a record number of young women in the U.S. expressing interest in moving abroad permanently.

👤WHO WAS INVOLVED: Gallup polling firm, young women ages 15 to 44, and young men for comparison.

📍WHEN & WHERE: Survey conducted in 2025; data reflects trends since 2007.

🎯IMPACT: Highlights a growing trend among young women tied to political and cultural shifts in the U.S.

A new Gallup survey reports that roughly one in five Americans say they would like to move permanently to another country. Among women aged 15 to 44, that number climbs dramatically to 40 percent, quadruple the share from 2014, when only about one in ten women in that age group said the same. This surge marks the highest gender divide Gallup has ever recorded on this question, with only 19 percent of men in the same age range expressing a desire to relocate abroad.

Gallup noted that the shift among young women first appeared in 2016, during Barack Obama’s final year as President. The change, the organization suggests, seems to stem more from cultural than purely political motivations, coinciding with years of intense debate over social identity, gender ideology, and abortion.

Those cultural and political divides were also visible in Virginia’s recent gubernatorial race, where Democrat Abigail Spanberger defeated Republican Winsome Earle-Sears. Spanberger captured about 65 percent of the female vote, compared to Earle-Sears’s 35 percent. The Democrat’s campaign emphasized her opponent’s pro-life stance.

A Spanberger spokesman stated, “The Republican nominee in this race has called abortion ‘wicked’ and just this year handwrote a note on Virginia’s proposed constitutional amendment protecting reproductive rights in Virginia, making clear that she is ‘morally opposed.’” The contest reflected how access to abortion continues to shape gendered voting patterns, particularly since the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision overturning Roe v. Wade.

Research has also found that nearly half of liberal women under 30 report having been diagnosed with a mental health condition, an unusually high rate that analysts link to social pressures, political polarization, and economic uncertainty. Notably, an estimated eight in 10 female voters under 30 cast a ballot for socialist Zohran Mamdani, helping fuel his victorious New York City mayoral campaign.

Surveys of Generation Z voters indicate diverging values along both political and gender lines. Young Trump supporters, especially men, are more likely to say they hope to marry and have children, while their counterparts who supported former Vice President Kamala Harris, predominantly women, tend not to want children at all.

Image by Mark Dixon.

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