[EM] Giving different voting weights to different people

[raphfrk at netscape.net]

 (I recognise that this is controversial)
 
 Anyway, arguably, where the are major power differentials, the concept of 1 person one vote is 
 less applicable. 
 
 For example, one of the problems with a world democratic government is that it will transfer 
 power to countries (or at least their citizens) which are not currently very powerful. This 
 means that powerful countries will resist any such change (and rightly so). The minimum that 
 would occur is that they would pay higher taxes and those taxes would be spent on the poorer 
 countries. Even worse would include forced social changes which are designed to reduce their 
 power.
 
 However, if a mechanism could be created that would maintain the current power balance, 
 maybe there would be less resistance. I am not actually an advocate of a world government, 
 but I think this topic can be handled better in that context than applying it to government at 
 the country level as most residents in a country are reasonably similar in power (with a small 
 number with high power).
 
 One option would be to come up with a measure of power for each country. Each citizen (or 
 maybe resident) of that country would be allowed vote an equal share of the country's power.
 
 This would mean that a US citizen's vote would have a higher weight than a citizen of a 3rd 
 world country.
 
 I make a suggestion at:
 
 http://wikocracy.com/wiki/index.php/Equalization_of_Members
 
 (I only added the power part, not the whole article)
 
 The power of a nation shall be the sum of:  Military Power: twice the total military spending over the previous decade  Economic Power: Average yearly GDP over the previous decade  Generosity: 10 times the country's contribution to the UN over the previous decade  Population: Population multiplied by the world's per capita GDP (averaged over the previous decade)  A country which spends 5% of its GDP on military forces, pays 1% of its GDP in taxes to 
 the UN and has a per capita GDP the same as the world's per capita GDP would score 
 the same in all 4 categories.
 
 I give a list of the ratings of various countries in the talk pages of the above article (USA 
 edges out China slightly, China's population advantage nearly exactly balances the USA's 
 miltary spending advantage. The next highest is Japan at around one quarter of them).
 
 http://wikocracy.com/wiki/index.php/Talk:Equalization_of_Members
 
 One problem with that it creates an incentive for countries to "cook the books".
 
 Another way of determining power would be to use the above to initially allocate power 
 and then have some way to keep it "current". For example, each country could be given 
 a power rating according to the above formula but trading in power "tokens" would be 
 allowed. A powerful country should be able to increase its representation by purchasing 
 more tokens. One issue here is that countries would never sell their tokens.
 
 This could be reduced by auctioning the seats every few years (rather than allowing trading).
 That way countries wouldn't think of specific seats as "theirs", so suggesting that the 
 country only buy 3 seats this time instead of 4 would not be political suicide. It is 
 economically equivalent, but people tend to value objects that are "theirs" over the same
 objects that are on auction. Also, the auction wouldn't count as a wealth transfer as
 each country would get seats in proportion to what they paid.
 
 Another system is from
 
 http://wikocracy.com/wiki/index.php/Talk:US_Constitution%2C_Twenty_Ninth_Amendment
 
 called the Gondour System (from Mark Twain)
 
 http://mark-twain.classic-literature.co.uk/curious-republic-of-gondour/
 
 In this people are given a vote for achievements. For example:
 
 Being Alive: 1
 Graduating 8th grade: 1
 Graduating high school: 1
 Graduating 11th grade: 1
 Pass a citizenship test: 2
 Get a degree (2-3 year): 2
 Getting a degree (4 year): 3
 Getting a Masters: 3
 Getting a Phd: 4
 Total taxes paid: 1 per $50k
 
 This means that most people will get 6-8 votes. It also means that children will get some 
 votes, giving them some say while at the same time giving them less of a weight. Also, 
 rather than at 18 getting all their vote, their voting strength will increase as time passes.
 
 One issue with that is that votes are effectively proxies for bullets (or at least proxies for 
 power). Nearly everyone in the US is equally capable of disrupting the orderly flow of 
 society and it is that and not some concept of fairness that means all should have equal 
 votes. Also, the cost of the corruption involved in figuring out what the weightings should 
 be is probably larger than any benefit from having unequal weights (unless they can be 
 clearly defined).
 
 A final option is to go with the system that the US had originally, a federal government with 
 1 person/1 vote and where the States pay taxes in proportion to their population without 
 reference to income. This means that it cannot be used as a wealth transfer system 
 because the tax per voter is kept stable.
 
 A slight variant on this system could be that votes are proportional to taxes paid. Each 
 country would declare its GDP and would pay taxes in proportion to that GDP. However, 
 the voting strength of the citizens (or residents) would be in proportion to the taxes paid 
 per capita. This could be accomplished by allocating seats in the legislatures in proportion 
 to the taxes paid by the countries. For things like electing a President, the votes would 
 have to have the weightings directly applied (or alternatively, an electoral college like 
 arrangement).
 
 One issue with that is that taxes can be imposed indirectly. The Kyoto treaty (if enforced) 
 will transfer money from more developed to less developed countries (in addition to 
 transfering from high pollution to low pollution countries). However, that would not show 
 up as taxes paid, so the paying country would not get its boost in representation.
 
 Maybe the rule should be all taxes less transfers or something.
 
 Also, that rule or any like it is likely to come under extreme fire. Head taxes may be 
 economically efficient, but they are not democratically popular. This means that 
 additional constitutional guarantees would be required, kinda like the rule not allowing
 States get less than 2 seats in the Senate in the US constitution.
    Raphfrk
 --------------------
 Interesting site
 "what if anyone could modify the laws"
 
 www.wikocracy.com 
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