Timeline for Is there a truly general voting impossibility theorem that applies to real elections?
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| Jul 10, 2016 at 6:55 | comment | added | Marcus Pivato | ...but this analysis is not correct. In practice, the actual amount of money extracted through the "democracy fee" (technically called the "Clarke tax") is generally rather small (because there are usually only a few pivotal voters, or none at all). When spread out over e.g. the population of California, the amount of money per voter would be infinitesimal. If I am a low-income voter, then the 0.001 cents per year which I would receive in democracy fee transfer payments from Texas will hardly compensate me for the fact that I have been totally disenfranchised by the social choice rule. | |
| Jul 10, 2016 at 6:52 | comment | added | Marcus Pivato | Hi Steven. Your proposal solves problem (II) (at least, as long as there is no trade or other economic interactions between Texas and California, which is sort of implausible). But I don't see how it solves problem (I). The problem is that rich voters have much more voting power than poor voters, so they will control the outcome. So the rule will be a plutocracy rather than a democracy. You claim "the people who put less monetary value on getting their preferred election outcomes will receive, on average, cash payments that they value more highly than they value those outcomes." .... | |
| Jul 21, 2014 at 2:14 | comment | added | Steven Landsburg | You can address both problems (I) and (II) if two separate polities --- say Texas and California --- both adopt this system, with Texas voters making their payments to Californians and California voters making their payments to Texans. Then none of the democracy fees are wasted (which addresses problem II) and the people who put less monetary value on getting their preferred election outcomes will receive, on average, cash payments that they value more highly than they value those outcomes (at least assuming that the average payments are the same in both polities). | |
| Jul 18, 2014 at 18:55 | history | answered | Will Sawin | CC BY-SA 3.0 |