<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_quote"><div><div>Ralph asked me to forward this message to the list....<br>
-------- Forwarded Message --------
<table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tbody>
<tr>
<th valign="BASELINE" nowrap align="RIGHT">Subject:
</th>
<td>"Total Vote Runoff" proposed as better way to determine
ranked-choice winners</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th valign="BASELINE" nowrap align="RIGHT">Date: </th>
<td>Tue, 1 Nov 2022 13:13:21 -0500</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th valign="BASELINE" nowrap align="RIGHT">From: </th>
<td>Ralph Suter <a href="mailto:RLSuter@aol.com" target="_blank"><RLSuter@aol.com></a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th valign="BASELINE" nowrap align="RIGHT">To: </th>
<td><a href="mailto:election-methods-request@lists.electorama.com" target="_blank">election-methods-request@lists.electorama.com</a></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>In a Washington Post opinion
article published today (11/2/2022), election law scholar Edward
Foley and economist (and Nobel laureate) Erik Maskin propose a
"tweak" to correct what they describe a flaw in how ranked choice
winners are currently determined. They call the resulting election
method a "total Vote Runoff".
<div>
<p>Would anyone like to
comment? It appears they are essentially proposing replacing
instant run-off voting with Condorcet voting.<br>
</p>
<p>-Ralph Suter</p>
<p>---------------------------------</p>
<h1 id="m_7347950249669031774main-content"><span>Alaska’s ranked-choice
voting is flawed. But there’s an easy fix.</span></h1>
<div>
<div>
<div><span>
<div><span>
<div><span>By
</span><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/people/edward-b-foley/" rel="author" target="_blank">Edward B.
Foley</a><span><span> and<span> </span></span></span><span rel="author">Eric S. Maskin</span></div>
</span></div>
</span><span></span></div>
<div><span>November
1, 2022 at 7:00 a.m. EDT</span></div>
<div><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/11/01/alaska-final-four-primary-begich-palin-peltola/" target="_blank">https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/11/01/alaska-final-four-primary-begich-palin-peltola/</a></div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Excerpt:<br>
<span></span></div>
</div>
</div>
<p>Alaska’s special election
in August for the House of Representatives was heralded as a
triumph for ranked-choice voting, because MAGA favorite Sarah
Palin, a personification of polarization, could not attract
enough second-choice votes from moderate Republican Nick
Begich’s supporters to win.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>That’s true. But the way
Alaska uses ranked-choice voting also caused the defeat of
Begich, whom most Alaska voters preferred to Democrat Mary
Peltola, the candidate who ended up winning.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>This anomalous outcome,
contrary to the principle that the majority’s preference
should prevail, would be easily remedied by one small change.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>The key to ranked-choice
voting is that a voter lists the candidates in order of
preference, starting with their favorite, rather than naming
just that favorite. The problem in Alaska — and other
ranked-choice systems now in use, from Maine to San Francisco
—<b> </b>is the rule for eliminating candidates when no one
gets a majority of first-place votes. By tweaking this rule,
Alaska’s system would become more palatable to Republicans and
Democrats alike, and more likely to be adopted across the
country.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>Begich was eliminated
because he had the fewest first-place votes. That seems
logical at first glance. But the flaw in this outcome — and
why Republicans have reason to be resentful — is that a
majority of voters would have favored Begich had the race come
down to a head-to-head matchup against either Peltola (52
percent to 48 percent) or Palin (61 percent to 39 percent). He
lost only because it was a three-way race.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>Here’s
how to fix the flaw. If Alaska eliminated the candidate with
the fewest <i>total</i> votes, rather than the fewest <i>first-place</i>
votes, the ranked-choice system would be sure to elect a
candidate such as Begich who defeats all rivals in one-on-one
matchups.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>Call it a “Total Vote
Runoff.” A candidate’s total votes in such a system would be
determined by the number of other candidates he or she is
ranked above. For example, when a candidate is ranked first on
a ballot in an election involving three candidates, then this
first-choice candidate is ranked above two other candidates
and gets two votes from this ballot.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>When that same candidate is
ranked second on another ballot, the candidate is favored over
only one other candidate and would receive only one vote from
that ballot.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>A candidate ranked last on
a ballot, or not ranked at all, is not favored over anyone and
gets no votes from that ballot.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>Calculating the number of
votes that a candidate gets on each ballot — two, one or zero
— and adding up the candidate’s votes from all the ballots
yields the candidate’s total votes.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>Using this method, we can
identify the number of ballots on which each of Alaska’s three
candidates was ranked first or second and then calculate each
candidate’s total votes (there were only three candidates in
the House special election):</p>
<blockquote>
<div id="m_7347950249669031774header">
<h3> <span>Alaska
House results using total vote runoff</span> </h3>
<p><b><span>First-place votes get
counted twice because voters put their first choice
ahead of two other candidates.</span></b></p>
<span>Column 1: Candidate</span><br>
<span>Column 2: first-place votes</span><br>
<span>Column 3: first-place votes,
counted again</span><br>
<span>Column 4: second-place votes</span><br>
<span>Column 5: Overall Total<br>
</span> </div>
<div id="m_7347950249669031774chart" aria-hidden="false">
<div>
<div>
<table cellspacing="0">
<thead><tr>
<th style="border-bottom:1px solid #000000;font-size:78%" colspan="1" scope="col"><br>
</th>
</tr>
</thead>
</table>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div id="m_7347950249669031774chart" aria-hidden="false">
<div>
<div>
<table width="341" height="99" cellspacing="0">
<tbody>
<tr>
<th style="font-size:100%" colspan="1" scope="row">Begich</th>
<td style="font-size:100%" colspan="1">53,810</td>
<td style="font-size:100%" colspan="1">53,810</td>
<td style="font-size:100%" colspan="1">81,253</td>
<td style="font-size:100%" colspan="1">188,873</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th colspan="1" scope="row">Peltola</th>
<td colspan="1">75,799</td>
<td colspan="1">75,799</td>
<td colspan="1">19,024</td>
<td colspan="1">170,622</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th colspan="1" scope="row">Palin</th>
<td colspan="1">58,973</td>
<td colspan="1">58,973</td>
<td colspan="1">31,611</td>
<td colspan="1">149,557</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div> <span> <span><span>Source:</span> <a rel="nofollow noopener
noreferrer" href="https://www.elections.alaska.gov/results/22SSPG/RcvDetailedReport.pdf" target="_blank">Alaska official results, Alaska
cast vote records, MIT Election Data and Science Lab,
Election Law at Ohio State, author calculations </a></span>
</span> </div>
</blockquote>
</div>
<div> </div>
<div>
<p>Palin had the fewest total
votes, so she would have been the first candidate eliminated
in a “Total Vote Runoff” tweak to RCV.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>With Palin eliminated, the
race would have been between Begich and Peltola. Because a
majority preferred Begich to Peltola, he would have been
elected. Total Vote Runoff captures the will of the majority
more accurately than Alaska’s current elimination system does.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>Republicans should like
Total Vote Runoff because its procedure would help ameliorate
the “<a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2022-election/mcconnell-says-republicans-may-not-win-senate-control-citing-candidate-rcna43777" target="_blank">candidate quality</a>” problem that
plagues their party, as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell
(R-Ky.) lamented. A candidate popular only with the party’s
base would be eliminated early in a Total Vote Runoff, leaving
a more broadly popular Republican to compete against a
Democrat.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p>Democrats, too, should
welcome Total Runoff Voting to protect against losses caused
by excessively progressive candidates who are unacceptable to
a large portion of independent voters. Alaska-style
ranked-choice voting might keep in contention a left-wing
candidate whose first-place votes reflect enthusiastic but
limited support, but Total Runoff Voting would promote
Democratic candidates whose wide appeal makes them more
competitive overall.</p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div></div>