[EM] Re to Fobes on why C in single-winner political elections need not be big..,

[David L Wetzell]

dlw

>
>
> Plurality voting and limited voting (and the Borda count if the voters
> are undisciplined) are about the only methods that _cannot_ handle 3 or
> (maybe) 4 popular choices along with any number of unpopular choices.
>

So you agree that IRV works w. relatively few popular candidates?

>
> > So it seems disengaged from reality to let C, the number of candidates,
> > go to infinity... and if a lot of candidates are not going to get
> > elected then to disregard voter info/preference over them is of much
> > less consequence.
>
> Although the number of popular candidates is now small, that's because
> we use plurality voting.  When we use better voting methods, the number
> of popular candidates will increase; of course not to infinity, but
> frequently beyond the 3 or 4 popular choices that IRV can handle with
> fairness.
>

dlw: This is a conjecture.  One that I don't think makes economic sense
when one considers all that is entailed with a competitive campaign for an
important single-seat election.

>
> Although it's a non-governmental example, take a look at the current
> VoteFair American Idol poll.  The number of popular music genres is
> about 5, and there are about 7 singers who get more than a few
> first-choice votes.
>
>      http://www.votefair.org/cgi-bin/votefairrank.cgi/votingid=idols
>
> IRV would correctly identify the most popular music genre (based on
> current results), but probably would not correctly identify the most
> popular singer.
>

Apples and Oranges.
There's no serious economic costs to competing in American Idol and so the
number of competitive singers is not naturally hampered by that and the
need for a large support base or expensive advertisements or connections
for important endorsements.

>
> Why would voters trust a voting method that stops getting fair results
> with so few popular candidates?
>

Because when one considers the potential candidates have for taking on
ideas, there isn't a need for a large number of candidates to make the de
facto center much more like the true center.

Only among theorists does one constrain candidates to fixed positions in
policy-spaces.

>
> Yes, IRV is easy to explain, but that advantage becomes unimportant as
> the number of popular candidates increases, which it will when better
> voting methods are adopted.
>

That may be your story, but when one adds realism with folks able to
express voice thru other means besides voting then it becomes less
important to amp up C much.  The non-competitive candidates can still move
the center.

And the opportunity cost of trying to settle on an alternative alternative
to FPTP than IRV will become apparent.
dlw

>
> Richard Fobes
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 3
> Date: Mon, 27 May 2013 20:54:22 -0400
> From: Warren D Smith <warren.wds at gmail.com>
> To: electionscience <electionscience at googlegroups.com>,
>         election-methods <election-methods at electorama.com>
> Subject: [EM] NY state "fair elections" public funding bill (comments
>         asap    please?)
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> http://assembly.state.ny.us/leg/?sh=printbill&bn=S04705&term=2013
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