4 ms·

You have better representation. Federally, my Senator represents ~3 million constituents, while my House representative represents ~800k. At the state level,

You have better representation. Federally, my Senator represents ~3 million constituents, while my House representative represents ~800k. At the state level, those numbers shrink from 3 million to 120,000, and from 800k to 40k. If you live in a state that really believes in state representation, like New Hampshire or Vermont, then your representative likely only has 3 or 4 thousand constituents. This means I can pop into their office and lodge complaints or show support in person, am more likely to talk to them in town halls, and I'm competing with fewer letters or phone calls for access. I've spoken in person to my state representatives many times on a variety of issues, but I've never gotten better than a (very much delayed) form letter from my federal representatives. Past that, in many municipalities, your judges and DAs are often elected, meaning you have influence over the course and nature of their platforms. If you want to see criminal justice reform, less qualified immunity for police officers, etc., you have far more capacity for influence over state and local legislatures than you do at a federal level.

ethbro 8y ago
That's true and fair. I suppose my counterpoint would come from the outsized effect "national level" money can have when it randomly falls on local elections (e.g. $50M on the GA-6 [1] for a special term that only ran until this year). It seems like there's a certain "supported by people outside of our community" distaste to mega-funding, but I'm not going to kid myself and imagine it's irrelevant either. I think I'd agree with you more if there were greater voter turnout. But then, my ideal democracy is a minimal, voter-defense-esque test to register to vote + voting days as holidays + tax rebate for voting. Essentially, everything you could do to increase turnout of informed voters. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia%27s_6th_congressional_district_special_election,_2017 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia%27s_6th_congressiona...
- bmelton 8y ago
  To be fair, the "national level" money would likely have to be split 50 ways anyway, as any national level events worth lobbying for would likely affect all the states, to varying degrees of reception. Past that, voter engagement is a tricky thing. It's easy to know what things we want to vote for, but it's hard to know whether or not those things are economically feasible unless we're economists. Trump's tax cuts, for example, had experts saying that through economic growth would pay for itself, while other experts have said there's no way that's possible. Similarly so with Bernie Sanders' health care proposals. See the recent pension crisis affecting Detroit, and may still cause strife in municipalities all over. Employee pensions are exactly the sort of thing I might vote for, only to find out 30 years down the road that it literally destroyed my town's government. It's harder and harder to be informed without being a multi-doctorate + JD, and we keep voting ourselves favors from the public largesse without knowing if they'll work or not. Tax too little, and infrastructure and services fall off. Tax too much, you experience capital flight, and infrastructure and services fall off. The wisdom of the masses isn't always, or even usually wise.
  - ethbro 8y ago
    We're of the same mind on a lot of things. ;) Watching recent history, I have a sneaking suspicion these same issues are why democratic nation-building has been such a failure. Expecting a country to transition from 0 to democracy in one generation is probably impossible. Especially when it becomes apparent that even elder democracies are mostly held together by the strength of their institutions in times of strain. Democracy works if everyone is educated, but as you pointed out, encounters substantial issues when (a) the problems at hand are too complex to be understood or (b) the knowledgeable vote (on both+ sides) is drowned out by an easily-swayed vote (e.g. for passion-arousing issues like free trade or immigration). If I were attempting to build a democracy, I'd instead attempt to compress ~1000 years of European history into ~100 years of gradual government transformation. But probably start with a monarchy...
    - bmelton 8y ago
      There's a reason that governments created by the imperial English tend to last well after it's been divested as a colony. They put in a government that really, only the government needs to know the mechanics of.

ethbro 8y ago

That's true and fair. I suppose my counterpoint would come from the outsized effect "national level" money can have when it randomly falls on local elections (e.g. $50M on the GA-6 [1] for a special term that only ran until this year). It seems like there's a certain "supported by people outside of our community" distaste to mega-funding, but I'm not going to kid myself and imagine it's irrelevant either. I think I'd agree with you more if there were greater voter turnout. But then, my ideal democracy is a minimal, voter-defense-esque test to register to vote + voting days as holidays + tax rebate for voting. Essentially, everything you could do to increase turnout of informed voters. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia%27s_6th_congressional_district_special_election,_2017 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia%27s_6th_congressiona...

bmelton 8y ago
To be fair, the "national level" money would likely have to be split 50 ways anyway, as any national level events worth lobbying for would likely affect all the states, to varying degrees of reception. Past that, voter engagement is a tricky thing. It's easy to know what things we want to vote for, but it's hard to know whether or not those things are economically feasible unless we're economists. Trump's tax cuts, for example, had experts saying that through economic growth would pay for itself, while other experts have said there's no way that's possible. Similarly so with Bernie Sanders' health care proposals. See the recent pension crisis affecting Detroit, and may still cause strife in municipalities all over. Employee pensions are exactly the sort of thing I might vote for, only to find out 30 years down the road that it literally destroyed my town's government. It's harder and harder to be informed without being a multi-doctorate + JD, and we keep voting ourselves favors from the public largesse without knowing if they'll work or not. Tax too little, and infrastructure and services fall off. Tax too much, you experience capital flight, and infrastructure and services fall off. The wisdom of the masses isn't always, or even usually wise.
- ethbro 8y ago
  We're of the same mind on a lot of things. ;) Watching recent history, I have a sneaking suspicion these same issues are why democratic nation-building has been such a failure. Expecting a country to transition from 0 to democracy in one generation is probably impossible. Especially when it becomes apparent that even elder democracies are mostly held together by the strength of their institutions in times of strain. Democracy works if everyone is educated, but as you pointed out, encounters substantial issues when (a) the problems at hand are too complex to be understood or (b) the knowledgeable vote (on both+ sides) is drowned out by an easily-swayed vote (e.g. for passion-arousing issues like free trade or immigration). If I were attempting to build a democracy, I'd instead attempt to compress ~1000 years of European history into ~100 years of gradual government transformation. But probably start with a monarchy...
  - bmelton 8y ago
    There's a reason that governments created by the imperial English tend to last well after it's been divested as a colony. They put in a government that really, only the government needs to know the mechanics of.