[manthatguysfast]

Ok...so I have an 8 page research paper due on Wednesday and I need a bit of help...

the broad topic we have to write on is "The Vote." I'm doing a paper on why voter turn out is low in America. I have about 3 pages so far and Im at a point where I want to talk about the First-past-the-post electoral system vs. proportational representation system. the only problem...for some reason im making this harder than it needs to be...

im trying to say that the FTFP system promotes the idea that a single vote doesn't count and that some people use the excuse that their vote doesn't count to not vote.

can someone explain, in plain english, how the FPTP system makes it so some votes are "wasted votes." i understand the system...im just at a loss for words of how to explain why proportional representation might encourage more people to vote (make peoples vote count more)

i know zapthycat or nick5641651324565348941684314 like to discuss politics...hopefully one of you sees this!

-------------------------------------------------------
NICE...this is my 3000th post! ok just had to add that..

------------------------------
oh yeah, im not saying one system is better than the other...i dont know nearly enough to say that, im just trying to state that some people in America believe their vote doesn't count because of our system and they would be happier if we had a PR system (fairvote)

nevermind, the research on that is too much to read at work. lol, i changed the intro and now im including socioeconomic factors that influence voter turn out.

[nick95673]

In every election a large % of the votes are "wasted" If you don't vote for the winner your vote is wasted. This is why polls are so important. A lot of people don't like to vote for a loser so they will vote for who they think will win so they can be on the side of the winner.

California is a good place to look for an example of people feeling their vote is "wasted". Most conservatives in Ca feel as if they are wasting their time when they vote for their Senators or President. It is in a way a de facto FPTP system. Because there are more Democrats in the state and we stagger voting for Senators the huge minority of Californians are locked out of picking their Senators. If we voted for both at the same time and everyone got one vote we would end up with a better representation of Ca. We would end up with the vote splitting like this
Democrat 1: 50%
Democrat 2: 10%
Republican 1: 40%
So we could have 1"D" and 1 "R"

But because of the de-facto FPTP system we have
Democrat 1: 60%
Republicam 1: 40%
2 years later:
Democrat 2: 60%
Republican 1: 40%
So we end up with 1 person getting 2 votes and have 2 "D"s

So because I know I am not in the majority party in my state I do not rush to the polls to vote for my Senators. I know I have no chance. If I thought for a second that the 40% I am member of had a voice I just may vote. Same thing for the presidential vote. In Ca I don't need to vote. The "D" will get my points anyways(If I want him to or not).



So proportional voting encourages those in a large minority to vote by giving them a voice. Even though it is a smaller voice than the majority they could at least get their foot in the door of leadership. It would also encourage those in the majority party to get out and vote. Because the majority would understand they can't run rough shot over the rest they would show up to vote for the other members of their party to try to stuff the box with their votes as much as possible.

[manthatguysfast]

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to nick95673 again.

thanks man, thats way more clear than some of the crap that i found concerning this topic! haha..still a bit confused, but this is for an english 1a class so i just need the essay to sound good, don't necessarily need to understand haha!