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> it takes about six minutes to vote Why does voting take 6 minutes? I think I used a voting machine maybe once in my life (in the Netherlands and apparently

> it takes about six minutes to vote Why does voting take 6 minutes? I think I used a voting machine maybe once in my life (in the Netherlands and apparently young enough to not have used those more often). Casting a vote on paper is usually checking a box with a red pencil, takes maybe a minute of dealing with the huge sheet of paper with all the candidates. Just curious.

mikejb 8y ago
I think this is measured on average, and it's possible that people are undecided, or look through everything and take their time making sure to do it right.
flatline 8y ago
When you are voting for a dozen candidates and a dozen ballot measures, it takes time to read through all of them and make sure you are marking the correct boxes, even when you know how you will vote in advance.
- blacksmith_tb 8y ago
  This is another reason (along with preventing remote hacks etc.) that vote-by-mail[1] is much more reasonable. It provides you with as much time as you need to look up candidates and issues. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote-by-mail_in_Oregon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote-by-mail_in_Oregon
  - tolas 8y ago
    Can confirm from Colorado. They send everyone a vote by mail application whether you ask for it or not.
  - int_19h 8y ago
    I don't know about Oregon, but in Washington you also get a thick voter pamphlet that goes over all the candidates and issues in great detail, including candidates' statements about themselves. For initiatives (referendums), it even has statements by pro and con groups, and rebuttals of each others' statements. And you get that way in advance of the election, too, so there's plenty of time to go over it and do any additional research you feel necessary. Here's an example from this year. https://www.kingcounty.gov/~/media/depts/elections/how-to-vote/voters-pamphlet/2018/08/edition-2-en.ashx?la=en https://www.kingcounty.gov/~/media/depts/elections/how-to-vo...
    - russdpale 8y ago
      Yeh its pretty great. I used the pamphlet and googme to look up all of thr candidates while I had some beer. Best voting experience ever.
    - blacksmith_tb 8y ago
      Yes, same in Oregon, though the pamphlet is oddly organized, with the candidates for different races jumbled together. The for/against arguments after the text of each ballot measure are very useful, as much for their arguments as to see what organizations are spending time and money to defend or defeat them.
  - hackandtrip 8y ago
    Sure, but you lose vote secrecy.
    - nine_k 8y ago
      Not necessarily. Grab a set of ballots in a public library, randomly from a pile, the way you can grab a set of tax forms. Send them from an arbitrary public mailbox at a busy place, like a train station or a mall. This should make tracking impractical, unless you expect "them" to scan for fingerprints.
    - ddingus 8y ago
      First, the vote is double enveloped, should you choose to do that. Not everyone does. It gets validated, then passed along for counting. Second, if you want, you may drop your ballot into any drop box, or hand deliver it to elections, who will validate it and put it into the counting queue.
    - blacksmith_tb 8y ago
      Not so much, it shifts secrecy from flimsy booths at a polling place to the voter, who presumably fills out their ballot in the privacy of their home, and then you have the option of dropping it off directly at the county elections office dropbox instead of mailing, if you're worried.
  - burfog 8y ago
    That article says: "30% of respondents said they voted more often since vote-by-mail was enacted." Uh, you're only supposed to vote once. Now the ballots show up, you can fill them out for all family members, even if recently deceased, and vote for everybody. That spouse doesn't need to vote. The high-school senior is too busy to do their own voting. The truly ambitious can even grab ballots out of mailboxes, adding them to their pile.
    - saulrh 8y ago
      Voted more often than they used to, which was once every fifteen years.
    - blacksmith_tb 8y ago
      They routinely reject ballots for not matching signatures - I had one returned which I had certainly filled out myself.
- GCA10 8y ago
  U.S. ballots also randomize the candidates' names, so that you can't scan each new list quickly by alphabet or political party to look for the person you intend to vote for. The result is that it takes more than a few seconds of sustained concentration to make sure that you're marking your ballot as intended. That's especially true when individual offices attract many small-party candidates.
Kalium 8y ago
American elections are very rarely one box. Generally there's a whole series of offices being elected separately, and probably several different measures of various sorts being voted on directly.
- atomi 8y ago
  Yup. Some states, with more direct democracies, have many citizen initiated propositions that people vote on as well.
p49k 8y ago
Sometimes there are 10-25 different votes you’re casting on a single ballot (for example: city council, judges/prosecutors, state representatives and senators, federal reps and senators, president, local and state ballot initiatives)
- ragebol 8y ago
  Aha, that explains.
mdorazio 8y ago
How few options were on the ballot you cast? In the most recent election here in California, there were a rather ridiculous number of candidates for most positions, plus quite a few propositions. Even if you pre-select your choices before hand, you still have to find those choices on the screen (or on the paper ballot) since the ordering might have changed from the sample ballot. I want to say it took me about 4 minutes to vote even with 100% pre-selected answers on my sample ballot to refer to. Other people who did less research took quite a bit longer.
- ragebol 8y ago
  usually many options to pick 1 from.
  - hannasanarion 8y ago
    American elections are more complicated. A typical November ballot will have upwards of 20 choices on it, for national, state, county, anf municipal positions, judges, and referendums.
    - logfromblammo 8y ago
      Around here, typical to have 1 to 3 federal races, 5 to 8 statewide offices, 10 to 20 county and municipal contests, a handful of judge retention questions, and 1 to 20 other referendums. About half the races are usually uncontested. It may take some time to fill out a ballot paper. But the act of voting itself is inserting the ballot paper into the locked and monitored ballot box, which takes a second or two. My polling place is filled with tables and chairs and cardboard privacy dividers, but has just one ballot box, with a scanner-tabulator on top of it. The electronic voting machines that take the place of the paper ballot are the problem. You need dozens per polling place, and each one is expected by design to be alone with a voter, with physical access and privacy, for tens of minutes. I presume by default that any jurisdiction using them is actively promoting the hacking of their own elections, and such presumption must be rebutted only by exposure of the facts of the process that would mistrust the communications coming from those boxes as compromised and potentially malicious. I cannot fathom how it would even be possible to secure such devices. At least the scanner-tabulators attached to ballot boxes can be watched continuously.
dagw 8y ago
In the US they often group together all federal, state, local and various referendums in the same election so it's not uncommon to have over a dozen choices to make when casting a vote.
14 8y ago
Most people would be quicker like a minute if I had to guess. But someone with a physical disability could easily take 6 minute. All you need is someone faking such a disability or ailment they could just pretend they are super slow moving so when they don't come out after 5 minutes no suspicion.
- whatshisface 8y ago
  Alternatively, they could say that they were thinking about which candidates to pick! On the ballots I have seen, party affiliations are listed, which means that it is expected that voters will enter the booth without knowledge of at least some candidates.
AnnoyingSwede 8y ago
Voting ballets in the netherlands are map-like large sheets with columns of names which you fill out behind a screen or on a table before being directed to a locked bin where you insert your folded sheet. In this way, the actual process of voting is over in the fraction of a second. You are not left alone with the bin at any time, and therefor can only effect your own vote, so it's hardly comparable to the electronic voting process of the states that use electronic voter.
acranox 8y ago
After Florida 2000, a lot of us take our sweet time double, and triple checking that we're marking the right box, and, in the case of paper ballots, very carefully filling in the box fully, but not too full.
jhayward 8y ago
The last time I voted, earlier this year, there were some 20+ races on the ballet and something like 60 candidates. It takes time to read through all that and choose correctly. With voting machines there is also extra UI, in my case related to the dial mechanism and back/next/submit buttons used for "checking boxes".
anigbrowl 8y ago
In other countries people usually just vote for a few offices or questions at a time. American voters are often presented with 30, 40 or even 50 ballot questions.

mikejb 8y ago

I think this is measured on average, and it's possible that people are undecided, or look through everything and take their time making sure to do it right.

flatline 8y ago

When you are voting for a dozen candidates and a dozen ballot measures, it takes time to read through all of them and make sure you are marking the correct boxes, even when you know how you will vote in advance.

blacksmith_tb 8y ago
This is another reason (along with preventing remote hacks etc.) that vote-by-mail[1] is much more reasonable. It provides you with as much time as you need to look up candidates and issues. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote-by-mail_in_Oregon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote-by-mail_in_Oregon
- tolas 8y ago
  Can confirm from Colorado. They send everyone a vote by mail application whether you ask for it or not.
- int_19h 8y ago
  I don't know about Oregon, but in Washington you also get a thick voter pamphlet that goes over all the candidates and issues in great detail, including candidates' statements about themselves. For initiatives (referendums), it even has statements by pro and con groups, and rebuttals of each others' statements. And you get that way in advance of the election, too, so there's plenty of time to go over it and do any additional research you feel necessary. Here's an example from this year. https://www.kingcounty.gov/~/media/depts/elections/how-to-vote/voters-pamphlet/2018/08/edition-2-en.ashx?la=en https://www.kingcounty.gov/~/media/depts/elections/how-to-vo...
  - russdpale 8y ago
    Yeh its pretty great. I used the pamphlet and googme to look up all of thr candidates while I had some beer. Best voting experience ever.
  - blacksmith_tb 8y ago
    Yes, same in Oregon, though the pamphlet is oddly organized, with the candidates for different races jumbled together. The for/against arguments after the text of each ballot measure are very useful, as much for their arguments as to see what organizations are spending time and money to defend or defeat them.
- hackandtrip 8y ago
  Sure, but you lose vote secrecy.
  - nine_k 8y ago
    Not necessarily. Grab a set of ballots in a public library, randomly from a pile, the way you can grab a set of tax forms. Send them from an arbitrary public mailbox at a busy place, like a train station or a mall. This should make tracking impractical, unless you expect "them" to scan for fingerprints.
  - ddingus 8y ago
    First, the vote is double enveloped, should you choose to do that. Not everyone does. It gets validated, then passed along for counting. Second, if you want, you may drop your ballot into any drop box, or hand deliver it to elections, who will validate it and put it into the counting queue.
  - blacksmith_tb 8y ago
    Not so much, it shifts secrecy from flimsy booths at a polling place to the voter, who presumably fills out their ballot in the privacy of their home, and then you have the option of dropping it off directly at the county elections office dropbox instead of mailing, if you're worried.
- burfog 8y ago
  That article says: "30% of respondents said they voted more often since vote-by-mail was enacted." Uh, you're only supposed to vote once. Now the ballots show up, you can fill them out for all family members, even if recently deceased, and vote for everybody. That spouse doesn't need to vote. The high-school senior is too busy to do their own voting. The truly ambitious can even grab ballots out of mailboxes, adding them to their pile.
  - saulrh 8y ago
    Voted more often than they used to, which was once every fifteen years.
  - blacksmith_tb 8y ago
    They routinely reject ballots for not matching signatures - I had one returned which I had certainly filled out myself.
GCA10 8y ago
U.S. ballots also randomize the candidates' names, so that you can't scan each new list quickly by alphabet or political party to look for the person you intend to vote for. The result is that it takes more than a few seconds of sustained concentration to make sure that you're marking your ballot as intended. That's especially true when individual offices attract many small-party candidates.

Kalium 8y ago

American elections are very rarely one box. Generally there's a whole series of offices being elected separately, and probably several different measures of various sorts being voted on directly.

atomi 8y ago
Yup. Some states, with more direct democracies, have many citizen initiated propositions that people vote on as well.

p49k 8y ago

Sometimes there are 10-25 different votes you’re casting on a single ballot (for example: city council, judges/prosecutors, state representatives and senators, federal reps and senators, president, local and state ballot initiatives)

ragebol 8y ago
Aha, that explains.

mdorazio 8y ago

How few options were on the ballot you cast? In the most recent election here in California, there were a rather ridiculous number of candidates for most positions, plus quite a few propositions. Even if you pre-select your choices before hand, you still have to find those choices on the screen (or on the paper ballot) since the ordering might have changed from the sample ballot. I want to say it took me about 4 minutes to vote even with 100% pre-selected answers on my sample ballot to refer to. Other people who did less research took quite a bit longer.

ragebol 8y ago
usually many options to pick 1 from.
- hannasanarion 8y ago
  American elections are more complicated. A typical November ballot will have upwards of 20 choices on it, for national, state, county, anf municipal positions, judges, and referendums.
  - logfromblammo 8y ago
    Around here, typical to have 1 to 3 federal races, 5 to 8 statewide offices, 10 to 20 county and municipal contests, a handful of judge retention questions, and 1 to 20 other referendums. About half the races are usually uncontested. It may take some time to fill out a ballot paper. But the act of voting itself is inserting the ballot paper into the locked and monitored ballot box, which takes a second or two. My polling place is filled with tables and chairs and cardboard privacy dividers, but has just one ballot box, with a scanner-tabulator on top of it. The electronic voting machines that take the place of the paper ballot are the problem. You need dozens per polling place, and each one is expected by design to be alone with a voter, with physical access and privacy, for tens of minutes. I presume by default that any jurisdiction using them is actively promoting the hacking of their own elections, and such presumption must be rebutted only by exposure of the facts of the process that would mistrust the communications coming from those boxes as compromised and potentially malicious. I cannot fathom how it would even be possible to secure such devices. At least the scanner-tabulators attached to ballot boxes can be watched continuously.

dagw 8y ago

In the US they often group together all federal, state, local and various referendums in the same election so it's not uncommon to have over a dozen choices to make when casting a vote.

14 8y ago

Most people would be quicker like a minute if I had to guess. But someone with a physical disability could easily take 6 minute. All you need is someone faking such a disability or ailment they could just pretend they are super slow moving so when they don't come out after 5 minutes no suspicion.

whatshisface 8y ago
Alternatively, they could say that they were thinking about which candidates to pick! On the ballots I have seen, party affiliations are listed, which means that it is expected that voters will enter the booth without knowledge of at least some candidates.

AnnoyingSwede 8y ago

Voting ballets in the netherlands are map-like large sheets with columns of names which you fill out behind a screen or on a table before being directed to a locked bin where you insert your folded sheet. In this way, the actual process of voting is over in the fraction of a second. You are not left alone with the bin at any time, and therefor can only effect your own vote, so it's hardly comparable to the electronic voting process of the states that use electronic voter.

acranox 8y ago

After Florida 2000, a lot of us take our sweet time double, and triple checking that we're marking the right box, and, in the case of paper ballots, very carefully filling in the box fully, but not too full.

jhayward 8y ago

The last time I voted, earlier this year, there were some 20+ races on the ballet and something like 60 candidates. It takes time to read through all that and choose correctly. With voting machines there is also extra UI, in my case related to the dial mechanism and back/next/submit buttons used for "checking boxes".

anigbrowl 8y ago

In other countries people usually just vote for a few offices or questions at a time. American voters are often presented with 30, 40 or even 50 ballot questions.