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> Tabulating IRV is much harder, necessitating more software, which obfuscates the process. This is a feature, not a bug. The count should be done by hand. The
by jacques_chester 8y ago
> Tabulating IRV is much harder, necessitating more software, which obfuscates the process.
This is a feature, not a bug. The count should be done by hand. The multiple rounds increase the probability that shennanigans will be detected, whether by sheer weight of watching eyes or by numerical irregularities between rounds.
> Election administrators hate IRV. They'll oppose, sabotage it at every turn.
I don't see how to predict which one they will like.
> IRV is confusing to voters. Try explaining it to your parents.
My parents are in their 70s and have voted this way since before I was born. My paternal grandparents were voting this way before my parents were born. My maternal grandparents voted this way when they moved to Australia.
Tens of millions of Australians vote this way and have done so for about a century.
It does not seem statistically likely that somehow Australia has had an uninterrupted run of particular genius at a multi-decadal/multi-million-person scale that nobody else in the world can replicate ever again.
- specialist 8y agoHow many races (contests) does a typical urban Australian election have? How many candidates for hotly contested races? How many ballots are procssed? My jurisdiction often has 30+ contests. We had 22 belligerents for mayor 2 years ago. I think we had 12 for senator in our most recent primary. I dimly recall my county counts 450k ballots.
- jacques_chester 8y ago> How many races (contests) does a typical urban Australian election have? Commonwealth, state and local elections are held separately. How many candidates for hotly contested races? For Senate elections it is not uncommon for there to be literally hundreds of names on the ballot, which is why "above the line voting" is an option. How many ballots are procssed? For a Commonwealth and State elections, millions, with an indicative count (ie, whether there a clear winner on first preferences) made on the same night by tallying across hundreds or thousands of polling stations. More to the point: it scales. The indicative count is easily parallelised to any level, since summation is a commutative operation. I think your implication is that Australia doesn't do it at a large enough scale and that therefore, our experiences don't count. That isn't true. Commonwealth elections are comparable in scale and complexity to the operations of those run by the largest states in the USA to handle federal elections.
- specialist 8y agoOf course your experience counts. I'm just making sure we're comparing apples to apples. It appears my very shallow understanding of Australian election administration is WAY off. (I'll need to find some sample ballots.) If you're handling large scale, complicated IRV elections with ease, than that should inform the efforts of our local proponents (eg fairvote.org).
- jacques_chester 8y agoI'm sorry for being touchy.
- specialist 8y agoNo worries. You and I have already crossed swords a few times before. And my writing style has been described as "aggressive". I do appreciate you setting me straight on this. I hate being wrong.