[Fwd: Re: [EM] [Fwd: Re: approval voting and majority criterion]]

[Ken Johnson]

Forest Simmons wrote:

>On Mon, 15 Mar 2004, Ken Johnson wrote:
>
>  
>
>>It may be that majority rule is preferable, but as illustrated above it
>>is clearly not self-evident that majority rule is always preferable.
>>Therefore majority rule should not be posited axiomatically; it needs to
>>be justified on the basis of a more fundamental statement of "the goal
>>of single-winner voting".
>>    
>>
>
>A more fundamental goal might be to go with the choice that would be
>acceptable to the greatest number of voters.
>
That sounds like Approval. The method follows directly and obviously 
from the statement of the goal, no formal proof required.

>By way of analogy, which is better, an economic system that makes 51% of
>the people rich and relegates the other 49% to abject poverty, or a system
>that makes 90% of the population comfortable, and still provides for the
>basic needs of the other 10%?
>
>Forest
>
>  
>
Better yet, how about a system that makes EVERYONE equally rich, 
although the 51% might be just slightly less rich than they would be 
under the first system.

Ken Johnson