[EM] FYI: Tacoma park IRV vote data

[Jonathan Lundell]

On Apr 15, 2009, at 1:02 AM, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote:

> Kathy Dopp wrote:
>
>> Notice how typically, Fair Vote claims that they found majority
>> winners by manipulating the definition of majority to mean only those
>> voters left standing by the final counting round.
>
> I wonder whether, if one were to make a "maximally wrong" IRV-type  
> method that eliminated the candidate most people voted for until  
> only two were left (and then picked the one who beat the other), FV  
> would still claim the "winner" to have been elected by a majority.
>
> E.g
>
> 30: A > D > C > B
> 20: D > C > A > B
> 20: C > A > D > B
> 23: B > A > C > D
>
> Plurality counts: 30: A, 20: D, 20: C, 23: B
>
> Eliminate A.
>
> 50: D > C > B
> 20: C > D > B
> 23: B > C > D
>
> Plurality counts: 50: D, 20: C, 23: B.
>
> Eliminate D.
>
> 70: C > B
> 23: B > C
>
> C wins by 70/93 = 75.3% of the votes. What a landslide!
>
> (Schulze and MAM gives A > D > C > B, and IRV gives A > B > C = D.)

That's really a mischaracterization of IRV. IRV (and STV in general)  
does not produce a candidate ordering. It simply finds a winner by  
interpreting the ballots as a list of contingent choices. In  
particular, no ranking is implied by order of elimination.