4 ms·

How about representation proportional to economic activity instead of the quantity of state-ness being one or zero? With guaranteed representation of at least

How about representation proportional to economic activity instead of the quantity of state-ness being one or zero? With guaranteed representation of at least one seat, so the representation turns out to be slightly skewed against the powerhouses. Also note that Puerto Rico and Washington DC earn their seat by virtue of having enough economic activity, rather than by default. "Seats" is senate seats per state; "rep" is proportion of total representation; "econ" is proportion of total economic activity. I picked 150 for the total number of seats to make the rep vs. econ gap narrower, but not so much as to make the poorest 25 completely irrelevant. state seats rep econ --------------------------------- California 20 13.3% 14.5% Texas 12 8.0% 8.7% New York 11 7.3% 8.2% Florida 7 4.7% 5.1% Illinois 6 4.0% 4.2% PA OH }- 5 6.7% 7.1% NJ GA WA MA NC }- 4 18.7% 19.5% VA MI } MD CO MN TN IN }- 3 10.0% 9.2% AZ WI MI CT LA }- 2 10.7% 10.7% OR SC AL } KY OK IA UT KS } NV DC AK NE MS } PR NM HI NH WV }- 1 16.7% 12.5% ID DE ME RI ND } AK SD MO WY VT } island terr. }- 0 0.0% 0.1% --------------------------------- Total 150

peteradio 7y ago
What is column 1 and 2 with the numbers?
- fwip 7y ago
  The first number column is "seats per state". The second number column is "combined percentage of representatives" - PA and OH each have 5 representatives, so combined they have (5+5)/150 = 6.7% of the representation. The third column is, I presume, the percentage of economic activity (GDP?) totaled among those states.
Nasrudith 7y ago
Economic activity would be a bad choice to tie to representation from perverse incentives. It would encourage outright sabotaging other states to preserve power when it would be more optimal to go with national net economic output instead of "best for my region". Essentially the same issues as regulatory capture but worse. It is also why auctioning off positions of power for fundraising would be a terrible idea - it encourages the biggest vested interest to buy it up and exploit it at the cost of everyone else.
- logfromblammo 7y ago
  It doesn't have to be a good choice; it just has to be better than "two per state, no matter what". The perverse incentive there encourages secession, state-splitting, endless intractable battles over Puerto Rican statehood or DC representation, and engineering politics at the state level to influence interstate migrations based partly on political views on national issues. I.e. Colorado decriminalizes recreational cannabis, and Alabama recriminalizes abortion. Lefties are incentivized to move from AL to CO, and righties the reverse. Everybody who voted Doug Jones leaves for literally greener pastures, and mall-menace Roy Moore wins the seat. (Anecdotally, one of my co-workers is moving to Denver, and I have realized I am envious.) It further incentivizes politically competitive states to do anything for just 0.1% of the vote, because that might just be the margin that gets you all the power, for six whole years, on election day.

peteradio 7y ago

What is column 1 and 2 with the numbers?

fwip 7y ago
The first number column is "seats per state". The second number column is "combined percentage of representatives" - PA and OH each have 5 representatives, so combined they have (5+5)/150 = 6.7% of the representation. The third column is, I presume, the percentage of economic activity (GDP?) totaled among those states.

Nasrudith 7y ago

Economic activity would be a bad choice to tie to representation from perverse incentives. It would encourage outright sabotaging other states to preserve power when it would be more optimal to go with national net economic output instead of "best for my region". Essentially the same issues as regulatory capture but worse. It is also why auctioning off positions of power for fundraising would be a terrible idea - it encourages the biggest vested interest to buy it up and exploit it at the cost of everyone else.

logfromblammo 7y ago
It doesn't have to be a good choice; it just has to be better than "two per state, no matter what". The perverse incentive there encourages secession, state-splitting, endless intractable battles over Puerto Rican statehood or DC representation, and engineering politics at the state level to influence interstate migrations based partly on political views on national issues. I.e. Colorado decriminalizes recreational cannabis, and Alabama recriminalizes abortion. Lefties are incentivized to move from AL to CO, and righties the reverse. Everybody who voted Doug Jones leaves for literally greener pastures, and mall-menace Roy Moore wins the seat. (Anecdotally, one of my co-workers is moving to Denver, and I have realized I am envious.) It further incentivizes politically competitive states to do anything for just 0.1% of the vote, because that might just be the margin that gets you all the power, for six whole years, on election day.