Comments on: Jeffrey Friedman on Voter Ignorance

By: Robert H.

Robert H. — Wed, 23 Oct 2013 00:36:44 +0000

In what possible societal arrangement are there not powerful elites? If they are the problem they aren’t the problem with democracy, they are the problem with humanity.

By: R Richard Schweitzer

R Richard Schweitzer — Tue, 22 Oct 2013 15:05:17 +0000

Read the comment by Counsellor to Friedman’s essay.

Keep in mind the question is framed around “Democracy” and “ignorance” (lack of information or “knowledge”?) of particular aspects of governmental functions as related to “Society.”

Perhaps the frame of the question needs be examined.

By: dve

dve — Tue, 22 Oct 2013 07:43:43 +0000

Libertarians are not (generally) team players. Caplan et al. are not (generally) team players. Voting is a team sport. Voting for your team counts.
It counts because you share the values (however “irrational”) your team and its leaders represent or, perhaps more often, you dissent from the values of the other team. Thus one need not understand the ins and outs of every issue one’s team supports to behave “rationally”. Culture is, by and large, an economical substitute for thought (rationality?); religion and political and affiliation too. Win or lose, my vote counts — unless, of course, I eschew team sports altogether. But then I’m on Bryan’s team, aren’t I?

By: Chris H

Chris H — Mon, 21 Oct 2013 21:11:25 +0000

“To raise the incentive of the average voter, you have to decrease the total number of voters.”

For the effect to be noticeable, you’d probably have to disenfranchise such a large portion of the populace that I doubt you could call it a democracy by modern definitions.

By: josh

josh — Mon, 21 Oct 2013 17:11:29 +0000

in athenian democracy they demarchy for representative/assembly positions. While it’s hard to ever imagine this happening in the US because of the size of the change (and that no nations today use a demarchy to my knowledge), randomly selecting voters to serve in the assembly would :

0) retain our representative system
1) increase the incentive the average voter has to pay attention (since their possibility of receiving some congressional salary/benefits would be non zero)
2) decrease the ability of special interests to influence elections

If implemented everywhere it could eliminate elections altogether, which would tackle the explotation of the irrational voter theorum ontop of the incentive problem. (Or you could just implement in the HOR).

somebody on eric schmidt’s g+ page was promoting this idea which like bryan caplan’s paying-for-civics test idea I think is a long shot, but worth including on the pile.

By: Ben Kennedy

Ben Kennedy — Mon, 21 Oct 2013 13:47:02 +0000

One of the standard pro-market arguments I truly appreciate is that prices coordinate the relative interests of people who have no contact with each other. I have heard it suggested that selling votes should be allowed. Could this have a similar information-transmission effect? Irrational voters would simply pick the highest bidder for their votes, coordinating the diverse interests of the rent-seekers and maximizing the value returned to the voter

By: Lupis42

Lupis42 — Mon, 21 Oct 2013 12:37:09 +0000

“Rational ignorance theory blames public ignorance on the low incentive to become a well-informed voter. Raise the incentives and you solve the problem”

The low incentive to become informed is based on the low ability of any one voter to affect policy, not on the impact of policy. The importance of policy isn’t the problem.

To raise the incentive of the average voter, you have to decrease the total number of voters.