Voting and Elections
Chapter 8
• “Who will guard the guardians?”
– The idea of being “qualified” to vote raises
problems
• Our answer to this question has changed a lot
over time
Restrictions on Franchise
– Colonial times (1620-1780s)
• No women
• Few Catholics, Jews, native Americans, or free Black
people
– i.e., some white, Protestant men could vote
• Not all white, Protestant men could vote.
– Each colony had a property qualification
– Why?
• Early Americans wanted to guarantee that
voters were virtuous and independent
– Impact of Calvinism
• That becomes the essence of the Protestant
Ethic
– Worldly success is a sign of personal salvation
• Revolutionary War (1776-1787)
– “No taxation without representation!”
– By 1830s, white male suffrage
• Women
Q: If all white men are qualified to vote, why not
white women?
A: Women’s rights get tangled up in racial issues
• What changed? Politics.
– The dominant party (Republicans) came to believe
women voting would help them.
- Prohibition
• African-Americans
– By the 1880s, Black male suffrage in the North
– By 1900, the “Jim Crow” (segregation) system was
entrenched in the South
• In 1965, Congress passes the Voting Rights Act
– Federal government to supervise elections in the
South
– Southern states forced to create majority-minority
electoral districts
• Young people (18-20 years old)
– 26th Amendment (1971) lowers voting age
– Impact?
Given all of these struggles…
• In 2000, a majority of Americans chose NOT to
vote
– Many blamed:
• Lazy young people
• Peace & prosperity
• Media effects
• BUT:
– Voter turnout was up to 60.7% in 2004
– 2008 turnout was expected to be very, very high
• Obama/Palin effects?
• Reality:
– 2008 turnout rate about 62%
– African-American turnout very high…
• …in the South
– 18-29 year old turnout ~ 51%
• Moral:
– A lot of what people “know” about elections is
wrong!
– Many ask, “Why do so many people stay home on
election day?”
• The better question to ask is:
– “Why does anybody bother to vote in the first
place?”
• Over 400 people are hit by lightning in the US
every year
This guy has been hit by lightning 3 times!
• In 2008, 131,257,328 votes were cast for
President
– My vote was 1 out of the total. So was yours.
• One vote “weighs”
– 1 / 131,257,328 =
– 0.000000007618 % of the total
– 7 ten-millionths of 1%!
• In 2008, SC cast 1,920,969 votes for Pres.
– My 1 made up 0.00000052057% of the total
• 5 millionths of 1%
• The odds of 1 vote deciding an election are
very, very, very small.
– People who say, “My vote doesn’t count” have a
bit of a point
• There’s also a flipside:
– For millions of people, just going out to vote can
be a challenge
• This is all to say something important:
– Millions of people see good reasons not to vote
• Here’s the point:
– Going out to vote produces benefits
– We can group those benefits into 2 categories:
Instrumental Benefit
• A vote is a means to an end
– It’s support for a candidate, a party, an idea
• BUT:
– A vote is one out of millions
• So, each vote has very little chance of affecting the
election
• Therefore, the instrumental benefit of voting is very
small!
Expressive Benefits
• Yet, millions of people vote
– Are they irrational? No.
– Many feel that it is important to vote
• “Civic Duty”
• “Responsibility”
• “Want to have my say”
• Since the instrumental benefit of voting is
always low:
– Most voters are motivated by expressive benefits
• But, not everyone responds to those
psychological benefits
• Civics classes and campaigns like VoD try to
get young people to develop expressive
benefits of voting.
– Do they work?
– Not much evidence they do, and they are
expensive!
Costs of Voting
• The benefits of voting are, at best, mostly
psychological
• The costs of voting are felt much more directly
• 2 types of cost:
Opportunity Cost
• Def: Time spent on one thing when you’d
rather do something else
– The time spent actually going out to cast a ballot
• Travel time, standing in line, lost income, etc.
Information Cost
• Def: Time spent figuring out who to vote for
and why
• An individual will vote when:
P(Bv) – Cv ≥ 0
WTF?
Individual Factors Affecting Turnout
• 4 most relevant:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Age
Education
Region of the country
Race
Age
• Single best predictor of individual turnout
– Around age 30, likelihood of voting increases
• Until around age 80
– Costs & benefits
Education
• Statistical effects of 1 year+ of college:
– Live about 8 years longer than high school
dropouts
– Earn about $600,000 more over the course of
one’s life
– 20% more likely to vote
• Why?
– Increasing education builds efficacy
• Def: A belief that one’s choices / opinions “matter”
• In terms of politics, efficacy takes 2 forms:
– “Internal efficacy”
• Increased ability to make sense of political info
– “External efficacy”
• Belief that one’s choices have an impact
Southerners
• Residents of former Confederate states
• Residents of states bordering the South
Non-white
• African-Americans & Latinos
– Each about 6% less likely to vote than Caucasians
& Asian-Americans
Problem
• All of these factors add up:
• Older, white, educated, northerner is almost
75% more likely to vote than a young, loweducation, non-white Southerner
• Institutional Factors also affect turnout
– The way we do elections give people reasons not
to vote
• Voter registration
– US is the only democracy that makes citizens
register to vote
– Most states require registration 30+ days before
election
Solutions
• “Motor-Voter” Act (1993)
– Can register to vote anywhere a driver’s license
can be obtained
• Same-day registration
– 9 states let people register on election day
• 10-12% increase in turnout
• “Election Day” is itself a problem
– Workday
– Limited hours
– Limited polling places
– Lots of different elections
• Federal, state, county, city, local, blah blah blah
• Solutions:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Multiple days to vote
Election Day holiday
Mail-in or Internet voting
Compulsory Voting
The Question
• All these factors produce voters who:
– Are disproportionately older, white, and educated
• But is this something we should be concerned
about?
Low Turnout is Bad – 3 Arguments
1. Voters don’t represent the nation as a whole.
2. Low turnout is caused by “phony” politics.
3. Nonvoters are more isolated, more selfish,
more ignorant of the world around them.
Low Turnout, No Problem
1. Low turnout means voter satisfaction.
2. Increasing turnout means mobilizing the less
educated & less interested.
3. Elections are a farce, anyway. Big money
always wins.