this post was submitted on 18 Nov 2024
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[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (2 children)

I don't understand why the USA doesn't use preferential voting like Australia does: https://www.chickennation.com/voting/

Instead of just picking one candidate/party, you number them based on your preferences. First all the #1 votes are counted. If no party gets the majority (over 50%) of votes, the party with the least number of votes is removed, and for everyone that voted for them, their #2 votes are used. Repeat until someone wins.

Independents (what you call "third-party" in the USA) can win, and any party that gets over 4% of the #1 votes gets election funding from the government (a fixed amount per vote).

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 hour ago

Because both of the major parties benefit from excluding the competition.

It's kind of like, if your car won't start, you need to take it to a mechanic, but because it won't start, you can't drive it to the mechanic. We need to change how our elections work because FPTP prevents us from implementing the policies we want, but it's precisely because it prevents us from implementing the policies we want that we're unable to change it. It's a catch-22.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

IRV, or RCV as it's being sold here, has a lot of problems.

It's the only voting system in existence where ranking someone higher on the ballot can cause them to lose the election.

Australia gets around most of the problems of IRV by just not telling people any information about the vote except the winners.

Also you only use straight IRV for a single part of your government.

The US would use it for every part of our government. It would be a shit show.

Which is why RCV has been banned in half a dozen states.

Now, there are better voting systems. Systems that live up to the hype.

STAR is the single best voting system designed to date.

As a cardinal voting system, it's actually immune to the Spoiler Effect.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 31 minutes ago (1 children)

It's the only voting system in existence where ranking someone higher on the ballot can cause them to lose the election.

Interesting... Do you have an example of this?