It's no secret that legislative bills routinely languish in Congress thanks to the intense partisan gridlock in Washington, D.C.
A new analysis of recent Congressional data, however, suggests a novel solution: Women may actually be more effective legislators than men.
Quorum, a startup that analyzes Congressional relationships and policymaking, found that over the past seven years, female legislators have been more likely to work with female members of the opposite party and more likely to see their bills passed compared to their male counterparts.
In the Senate, the average female senator co-sponsored 6.29 bills with another female senator, while the average male senator co-sponsored 4.07 bills with a male peer.
Women are also more likely to introduce more bills, get them out of committee, attract more co-sponsors and see their bills passed. Overall, the average female senator introduced 96.31 bills over the past seven years, whereas the average male senator introduced 70.72 bills.
Though the results weren't the same in the House of Representatives, Quorum did find that female members co-sponsor legislation with each other, both within and outside of their party affiliation, more often than men.
Alex Wirth, a cofounder of Quorum and a Harvard senior, told Mashable that female senators, in particular, may be more productive and successful at legislating than their male counterparts because of a "strong network of bipartisanship" fostered by regular meetings and dinners.
Perhaps the 114th Congress may show even better results since women now hold a record 104 Congressional seats
The productivity of female legislators, Wirth said, is a "glimmer of hope in what is an overall difficult scenario in Congress."
