One way the Tea Party has benefited female candidates - and the conservative movement generally - is by consciously steering clear of social issues.

In the US in recent years, around a third of all open management positions have gone to women. My research over the last three years has shown that the trend is going in the same direction at all levels. And by the way, it's not necessarily that the rise of women is causing the end of men - it's more the other way around. An increasing number of men are failing during their education, losing their jobs and then not managing to get back on their feet, so women have had to step in. The driving force here isn't feminist conviction, it's economic necessity.

Pop culture is like our subconscious.

Factories not what they used to be - they're all extremely high-tech.

Blog culture has a hard time digesting narratives, but it has an easy time digesting 'big ideas' pieces.

Men are now also in the minority among the entering traditionally male-dominated areas such as law and medicine. Finance and politics are still firmly in male hands, but in many other areas it seems the proportions are shifting in women's favor. Boys are doing worse at school and university. It's only logical that this imbalance, which can be observed in most industrialized countries, will change conditions on the job market.

What the economy requires now is a whole different set of skills: You need intelligence, you need an ability to sit still and focus, to communicate openly to be able to listen to people and to operate in a workplace that is much more fluid than it used to be. Those are things that women do extremely well.