There’s a similar, and rarely acknowledged, class element to the current hot-button topic of sexual harassment and assault. The #MeToo movement has shown that the plague of male sexual predation affects even the wealthy and glamorous, but the options available to A-listers preyed on by monsters like Harvey Weinstein are different from those available to struggling newbies trying to get a foothold in the entertainment industry. And the newbies’ range of choices are, by the transitive property of socioeconomic power, often greater than those on offer for hospitality, domestic, and farm workers. Victims at the bottom of the economic food chain may be terrified by the genuine possibility that kicking up a fuss will lose them the income they rely on to put food on the table. They also may refrain from seeking police help, for fear of losing their public-subsidized housing or being handed over to immigration authorities. Likewise, though domestic violence knows no class or cultural boundaries, it’s far easier to leave a violent home when you’re confident the alternative isn’t sleeping on the street. Gendered violence is about power, and two things that significantly decrease the power disparity between two people are legal rights and independent financial means.

Despite the claims of the many high-profile apostles of trickle-down feminism, women simply cannot live on inspiration alone. It doesn’t matter how many kick-ass, powerful role models present themselves on the public stage; material factors significantly shape what’s possible for different people. Imagine two teenage girls, both smart, driven, and keen to pursue a career in politics. One has her own bedroom, no caregiving commitments within her family, and a quiet place to study each night. The other looks after her two small siblings after school until her mother gets home from work at around 8 p.m. One works hard, secures a place at Harvard and completes unpaid internships on the Hill during summer breaks—something that’s only possible because her parents agree to pay her rent. Against the odds, the other also gets the grades to be admitted to an Ivy, but she decides to attend a local college to minimize debt and stay close to her mother, who still sometimes needs help with child care. She works a fast-food job on the side to cover her basic living costs. The first graduates with honors. The second starts off well, but then her little brother gets sick, and the family’s insurance won’t cover all the expenses. It becomes harder to justify staying in college, and eventually she drops out to work full-time and help more with bills. Which one of these two young women, both brimming with potential, is more likely to achieve her dream?

Now think of two presidential candidates. One is standing on a platform of universal free health care, free public college tuition for all, universal child care and preschool, and a $15 federal minimum wage. The second is standing on a platform of slightly expanding existing, patchy health care coverage, free tuition for in-state students at public colleges, a cap to ensure that no family has to spend more than 10 percent of its income on child care, and a vague proposal for a minimum wage increase. The second candidate is a woman, the first is a man. Without expending too much time relitigating the well-worn, bitter particulars of the 2016 Democratic presidential primary, it seems clear to me that the first candidate’s platform is more beneficial for the second of our imaginary teenage girls, the one whose life chances are severely restricted by economic factors and family responsibilities. For the first girl, however, the policy differences described don’t matter much. Her family already has excellent health insurance. She’s already attending an Ivy League college. Her family doesn’t struggle with child care costs. It’s unlikely she’ll ever work for minimum wage, and, if she does, her income will probably be subsidized by her parents. In her case, it seems quite plausible that the benefit she derives from having a female president as a role model is greater than the benefit she’ll derive from more materially redistributive social policies.

Of course, there are all sorts of possible objections to the short summaries of Sanders’s and Clinton’s respective 2016 platforms that I’ve provided here. I chose a select handful of policies because I personally think they are important, and because they lend themselves well to direct comparison. Your mileage may vary. There are also parallel debates about electability, not to mention the political and economic feasibility, of each candidate’s platform, all of which are plausible reasons to favor one candidate over the other. For what it’s worth, I believe that, taking all factors into account, Sanders was the preferable candidate, but for the purpose of this essay it doesn’t matter whether I’m right. The point is this: It was my sincerely held opinion that the male candidate was better for women than the female candidate, because his policies did more to improve the lives of low- and middle-income people.