Non-voters and the two-party system.

[Fluffy Coyotes]

Supposedly only 4 out of 7 eligible voters actually voted in the 2008 US Presidential Election. One cannot help wondering what's holding 3 out of 7 people back.

But this isn't necessarily to say we should force them to vote, or even necessarily strongly pressure them; obviously, if not voting is a bad decision, who they'd vote for wouldn't be a good one either. This is to say that examining why may help not only persuade them to vote, but persuade them to make a dent in the two-party system.

You'll notice an increasingly popular justification for not voting is that people want nothing to do with either of the "two candidates." But if we remind them that there are more than two candidates, that justification gets a little hard to support. Obviously voting for someone who isn't either of the two candidates makes more sense than letting one or the other win. If we were to succeed at let's say, even convincing two thirds of the non-voting population to vote, that is 2 out of 7 people voting third party this election.

That's a hell of a lot of extra competition to be forcing both major parties to contend with.

[Silent Majority]

Third parties don't do well in electoral systems that use plurality voting, unless a third party builds up a strong regional base. Increased voter participation wouldn't change that.

[Vazeckta]

Well, there really are only two candidates, considering the near impossibility of a third party winning. But, if we encouraged non-voting 3rd party caucusing people to vote, the electoral college would need a revamp, since 270 won't work if there are 3 or more parties vying for votes.
I think a lot of people just don't care though. My friend told me that sometimes his parents just don't vote because they'd been at work and don't want to go back out again.

[Bombadil]

Why I don't vote..

I don't care to go through the admin or taking time out of my day to go do it
I'm a white male, comfortably off and no children so, really, I'm about the least affected as to whoever gets in.

Consideration of a third party wouldn't change that.

One might call that selfish but then I am capable of far greater good in daily life than a vote would ever make, not that I fulfil that capability all the time but still..

[Seleucas]

I didn't vote in 2008, and not because I had no opinion on the candidates who were running. I don't believe any party would actually implement the policies I would want; campaigning for an office you plan to diminish or abolish is generally against the candidate's self-interest as well as the organization that would get him into power (who would be better served using the power they gain to expropriate than to leave people be.) I like to think of it as being akin to getting Richard Dawkins into the papacy, it's not going to happen.

[Atollus]

Not only are the two parties unworthy of my vote. The Electoral system makes the democratic process largely gridlocked and pointless. Combine that with the large population in America and a single vote is practically worthless. Its little different than the concept of inflation. Until the electorate is abolished voter apathy is likely to increase, even more so as the population gets smarter with each generation. As Americans wise up to the two parties of wimps and goons, less will vote. Simple.

[Arumdaum]

Well, there really are only two candidates, considering the near impossibility of a third party winning. But, if we encouraged non-voting 3rd party caucusing people to vote, the electoral college would need a revamp, since 270 won't work if there are 3 or more parties vying for votes.
I think a lot of people just don't care though. My friend told me that sometimes his parents just don't vote because they'd been at work and don't want to go back out again.

The spoiler effect pretty much prevents people voting third party.

[Vazeckta]

Well, there really are only two candidates, considering the near impossibility of a third party winning. But, if we encouraged non-voting 3rd party caucusing people to vote, the electoral college would need a revamp, since 270 won't work if there are 3 or more parties vying for votes.
I think a lot of people just don't care though. My friend told me that sometimes his parents just don't vote because they'd been at work and don't want to go back out again.

The spoiler effect pretty much prevents people voting third party.

Spoiler effect?

[Wamitoria]

The spoiler effect pretty much prevents people voting third party.

Spoiler effect?

Voting for candidate A, who is to the right of candidate B, allows candidate C to win with a lower percentage of the vote than would otherwise be possible.

[Arumdaum]

The spoiler effect pretty much prevents people voting third party.

Spoiler effect?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoiler_effect

Like pretend there's three parties on the ballot.

The dinglewobbler party, the doogoowaga party, and the angry moms party.

The dinglewobblers are a third party, and are pretty apathetic about the doogoowagas, but really hate the angry moms party.

And pretend these were the results:
Dinglewobbler 18%
Doogoowaga 39%
Angry moms: 43%

The angry moms party wins because the vote against it was divided. This is the spoiler effect, and it occurs under first past the post systems. Pretty much what happened in Florida in the 2000 election with Ralph Nader.

[Seleucas]

Not only are the two parties unworthy of my vote. The Electoral system makes the democratic process largely gridlocked and pointless. Combine that with the large population in America and a single vote is practically worthless. Its little different than the concept of inflation. Until the electorate is abolished voter apathy is likely to increase, even more so as the population gets smarter with each generation. As Americans wise up to the two parties of wimps and goons, less will vote. Simple.

Ya, that's a big thing too; my vote is irrelevant, so it's not going to do me any good to participate.

[Ostroeuropa]

The Fresh Start Party

If elected, we shall pass a bill banning the democratic and republican parties for a period of 100 years, and ban all current posistion holders above aldermann or are within these parties and earning X moneys from political activity from participating in an election for 20 years.
We will pass campaign finance reform legislation.
We will resign after 1 year in office.

[Risottia]

Supposedly only 4 out of 7 eligible voters actually voted in the 2008 US Presidential Election.

"Supposedly"?
You mean the US gov't doesn't know how many eligible voters there are, and how many of them actually voted?

One cannot help wondering what's holding 3 out of 7 people back.

FPTP might be a cause.
With FPTP, most of the times, a large chunk (or even the majority) of the voters don't get any representation - because the seat/offices goes to a list/candidate who won the plurality, with figures typically between 30% and 55%.

If I know that I'm not getting any representation anyway, why should I even bother to vote in the first place? I'd go rather back to "no taxation without representation" and stop paying the taxes.

[Chestaan]

I suppose part of the reason why many don't vote is because they know that either the Democrats or Republicans are almost certain to win in their state. I would think that voting numbers in swing states would be much higher. I really think the American system needs to be completely re-designed. The electoral college should be abolished and FPTP should be replaced by PR. It would be far from a perfect but it would be vastly superior to the current system.

[Forsakia]

Supposedly only 4 out of 7 eligible voters actually voted in the 2008 US Presidential Election.

"Supposedly"?
You mean the US gov't doesn't know how many eligible voters there are, and how many of them actually voted?

I think it includes people who are probably eligible but not registered to vote.

One cannot help wondering what's holding 3 out of 7 people back.

FPTP might be a cause.
With FPTP, most of the times, a large chunk (or even the majority) of the voters don't get any representation - because the seat/offices goes to a list/candidate who won the plurality, with figures typically between 30% and 55%.

If I know that I'm not getting any representation anyway, why should I even bother to vote in the first place? I'd go rather back to "no taxation without representation" and stop paying the taxes.

On the PR point, I think New Zealand was the most recent country to change from plurality to PR systems and didn't see an uptick in voter turnout.

[Risottia]

"Supposedly"?
You mean the US gov't doesn't know how many eligible voters there are, and how many of them actually voted?

I think it includes people who are probably eligible but not registered to vote.

WTF do they mean "probably eligible"? One is eligible or he's not. Tertium non datur. I'd require the gov't to know it for sure.

On the PR point, I think New Zealand was the most recent country to change from plurality to PR systems and didn't see an uptick in voter turnout.

Here in Italy we had a steady decay in the number of voters since FPTP and PR-with-threshold were introduced (respectively in 1993 and 2006).
When we had pure PR, no threshold, we had about 80-85% turnouts.

[The USOT]

Personally I am of the oppinion that Politics should be taught in the classroom from an early age.
Not to teach a specific bias, but frankly asside from concientus objectors a lot of people dont understand why voting is so important/are not familiar enough with different policies etc.

[Gauntleted Fist]

WTF do they mean "probably eligible"? One is eligible or he's not. Tertium non datur.

There are a lot of things in the US that can keep you from registering to vote. People that are over eighteen but not actually registered are therefore "probably eligible", but may not be for any number of reasons.

I'd require the gov't to know it for sure.

Registering to vote is not a mandatory thing in the US. You can quite literally go your whole life without even approaching a polling station. It's kind of silly to track people who aren't registering to vote for voter eligibility. They're not voting, why track them for voting?

[Forsakia]

I think it includes people who are probably eligible but not registered to vote.

WTF do they mean "probably eligible"? One is eligible or he's not. Tertium non datur. I'd require the gov't to know it for sure.

There are a set of requirements for voting. Being over 18, citizenship, etc, makes you potentially eligible but to be actually eligible you also have to register to vote. The requirements get checked when someone registers to vote, but some people are potentially eligible to vote who don't register and so don't get checked.

So there's this number of people who are probably potentially eligible, but since they haven't been checked they might not be hence the uncertainty (hell, even with censuses etc they don't have exact numbers on the number of people living in the country).

[SquareDisc City]

With FPTP, most of the times, a large chunk (or even the majority) of the voters don't get any representation - because the seat/offices goes to a list/candidate who won the plurality, with figures typically between 30% and 55%.

On the contrary, my view is that regardless of whether the MP I have is the one I voted for, it's still their job to represent me in Parliament, to be aware of how the national laws will affect the local issues and argue against that which will have a negative impact.

[Fluffy Coyotes]

"Supposedly"?
You mean the US gov't doesn't know how many eligible voters there are, and how many of them actually voted?

No, I'm using that as a qualifier just in case it could be wrong. There's no source I'm 100% certain I trust.

[Meridiani Planum]

I suppose part of the reason why many don't vote is because they know that either the Democrats or Republicans are almost certain to win in their state. I would think that voting numbers in swing states would be much higher. I really think the American system needs to be completely re-designed. The electoral college should be abolished and FPTP should be replaced by PR. It would be far from a perfect but it would be vastly superior to the current system.

I tend to agree, though I'll admit that part of my incentive for agreeing is that I vote "third party" virtually exclusively, and I'd like to see third parties have a better chance to have some influence at the national level.

If there is some concern about stability, one could have PR in the House of Representatives, and have FPTP (or maybe some ranking system) in the Senate. That would mean that the most popular parties (probably the GOP and Democrats) would dominate the Senate, but third parties would have a better chance at the House of Representatives.

[Empire of Vlissingen]

I think there will be more votes in a political system like in the Netherlands.
With No state votes but just one election and multiple parties.
In the Netherlands around 3 in 4 people vote.

[Eireann Fae]

I don't vote because I live in Texas. This is a solid red state, and that is not going to change.

I did vote once, I believe it was in 2008. The approximate numbers for who voted what, with my selection in bold:

Republican - 2.4 million
Democrat - 2.1 million
Progressive - 100,000
Green - 17,000

Even if all three non-reds banded together, Perry would still have kept a firm grip on the governorship. Suffice it to say, I was disappointed my first - and likely last - time out voting.

[Farnhamia]

I don't vote because I live in Texas. This is a solid red state, and that is not going to change.

I did vote once, I believe it was in 2008. The approximate numbers for who voted what, with my selection in bold:

Republican - 2.4 million
Democrat - 2.1 million
Progressive - 100,000
Green - 17,000

Even if all three non-reds banded together, Perry would still have kept a firm grip on the governorship. Suffice it to say, I was disappointed my first - and likely last - time out voting.

So your guy didn't win and now you're giving up? You could join the Democrats and work hard to turn Texas around. After all, the state gave us Lyndon Johnson once upon a time.