For a number of years, nearly all Americans say that they would vote for a woman for president IF she were qualified, and IF she were from their own political party. But is America ready for a female president? A CBS/New York Times poll asked this question of a random sample of 1229 adults, with the following results:

a. Construct a 95% confidence interval for the proportion of all Americans who now believe that America is ready for a female president.

b. If there were n₁ = 610 men and n₂ = 619 women in the sample, construct a 95% confidence interval for the difference in the proportion of men and women who now believe that America is ready for a female president. Can you conclude that the proportion of men who now believe that America is ready for a female president is larger than the proportion of women? Explain.

c. Look at the percentages of €œyes€ responses for Republicans, Democrats and Independents now compared to the percentages in 1999. Can you think of a reason why the percentage of Democrats might have changed so dramatically?

% Responding "Yes" Now 1999 Total 55% 48% Men 60 46 Women 51 49 Republicans Democrats 48 47 61 44 Independents 55 54