5 ms·

Are you suggesting a way to verify your vote was counted correctly is needed? Wouldn't that provide the ability for folks to sell their vote by being able to sh

by 83457 7y ago

Are you suggesting a way to verify your vote was counted correctly is needed? Wouldn't that provide the ability for folks to sell their vote by being able to show someone else?

dfxm12 7y ago
No, you already have the ability to sell your vote.
- rounce 7y ago
  But not the means to prove you’ve held up your end of the deal.
- MichaelApproved 7y ago
  Without proof that you voted a certain way, people are unlikely to pay you. That's why some states don't allow you to take a picture of a ballot that you filled out. They're trying to prevent you from confirming that you voted a certain way.
  - criddell 7y ago
    First, why shouldn't I be allowed to sell or trade my vote? Secondly, there are states where you can vote by mail. Do you know if vote selling is a big problem in those states?
    - Frondo 7y ago
      I lived in Oregon--which has had exclusively vote by mail for decades--for a while and never heard anyone bring up vote selling as a risk to election integrity. No one (journalists, legislators, etc) ever claimed it was happening. The state republican party still makes occasional claims of voter fraud, but those are exceedingly rare -- something like 54 ballots out of 4 million in the 2016 election cycle -- and they mostly come down to people voting in Oregon and in another state at the same time. The only reported case of election fraud I can remember was in 2016 and done by a republican, in which she tossed out a bunch of democratic voter ballots. That's it. For two decades of elections, Oregon hasn't had a problem with election integrity. They do, however, have a consistently high turnout, which they attribute to vote-by-mail.
      - monocasa 7y ago
        Oregon has a scheme to allow you to replace your mailed in ballot is why. And this is a real issue, vote buying and cohersion has historically been the most common voter fraud mechanism in the US. It's a major part of how the Boss Tweed and his associates ran New York.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    - na85 7y ago
      >First, why shouldn't I be allowed to sell or trade my vote? It's not about you selling your vote, it's about coercion. If your vote is verifiable, then you can be threatened with bodily harm for not voting a certain way, and/or for failing to verify that you voted a certain way. Your freedom to sell your vote is worth less than someone's freedom to vote free of intimidation or threat of violence.
    - chowells 7y ago
      In the two states with vote-by-mail I've lived in, you can always hand-submit a paper ballot that takes precedence over your mailed one. The only way someone could be sure you voted one particular way is to monitor your actions for 100% of the time after you mailed the ballot. This is less ideal than voting in person for everyone, as it still has failure cases like sufficiently abusive relationships. But it's an overall improvement over the previous system. Significantly more of the population votes in practice, making the vote a better measure of the ever-nebulous "will of the people".
  - lawn 7y ago
    Record a video of you voting. It's pretty easy to conceal it if you want to. Or have a person follow you and see what you do. Which would've worked all times I've voted here in Sweden.
    - monocasa 7y ago
      That's not really scalable though. A few people might be able to get away with those schemes, but a few people generally isn't enough to swing an election.
- kortilla 7y ago
  Yes, multiple times for multiple different candidates because there is no way to prove who you voted for. There is a reason nobody does this in practice.
- delecti 7y ago
  There's no way to verify you voted a certain way, making buying votes less reliable.
  - dfxm12 7y ago
    Yes, but the question was about the ability to sell, not verifying the reliability of people who engage in this type of illegal activity.
- InitialLastName 7y ago
  You can't meaningfully sell your vote unless you can prove you voted a certain way. I'm certainly not going to pay you to vote the way I want without proof of delivery.
- mbesto 7y ago
  Please explain? It's not currently technically possible to provide proof that you voted for a specific person and thus making it impossible to buy votes. The fact that you cannot personally verify whether your vote gets counted is a feature, not a bug.
  - dfxm12 7y ago
    You're making this false assumption that proof of voting a certain way is a requirement to sell or buy a vote in the first place. It's not.
wittrock 7y ago
There are some ways to do this on paper ballots! They aren't foolproof, but provide optional verification of votes without relying on electronic voting. An example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scantegrity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scantegrity

by 83457 7y ago

Are you suggesting a way to verify your vote was counted correctly is needed? Wouldn't that provide the ability for folks to sell their vote by being able to show someone else?

dfxm12 7y ago

No, you already have the ability to sell your vote.

rounce 7y ago
But not the means to prove you’ve held up your end of the deal.
MichaelApproved 7y ago
Without proof that you voted a certain way, people are unlikely to pay you. That's why some states don't allow you to take a picture of a ballot that you filled out. They're trying to prevent you from confirming that you voted a certain way.
- criddell 7y ago
  First, why shouldn't I be allowed to sell or trade my vote? Secondly, there are states where you can vote by mail. Do you know if vote selling is a big problem in those states?
  - Frondo 7y ago
    I lived in Oregon--which has had exclusively vote by mail for decades--for a while and never heard anyone bring up vote selling as a risk to election integrity. No one (journalists, legislators, etc) ever claimed it was happening. The state republican party still makes occasional claims of voter fraud, but those are exceedingly rare -- something like 54 ballots out of 4 million in the 2016 election cycle -- and they mostly come down to people voting in Oregon and in another state at the same time. The only reported case of election fraud I can remember was in 2016 and done by a republican, in which she tossed out a bunch of democratic voter ballots. That's it. For two decades of elections, Oregon hasn't had a problem with election integrity. They do, however, have a consistently high turnout, which they attribute to vote-by-mail.
    - monocasa 7y ago
      Oregon has a scheme to allow you to replace your mailed in ballot is why. And this is a real issue, vote buying and cohersion has historically been the most common voter fraud mechanism in the US. It's a major part of how the Boss Tweed and his associates ran New York.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - na85 7y ago
    >First, why shouldn't I be allowed to sell or trade my vote? It's not about you selling your vote, it's about coercion. If your vote is verifiable, then you can be threatened with bodily harm for not voting a certain way, and/or for failing to verify that you voted a certain way. Your freedom to sell your vote is worth less than someone's freedom to vote free of intimidation or threat of violence.
  - chowells 7y ago
    In the two states with vote-by-mail I've lived in, you can always hand-submit a paper ballot that takes precedence over your mailed one. The only way someone could be sure you voted one particular way is to monitor your actions for 100% of the time after you mailed the ballot. This is less ideal than voting in person for everyone, as it still has failure cases like sufficiently abusive relationships. But it's an overall improvement over the previous system. Significantly more of the population votes in practice, making the vote a better measure of the ever-nebulous "will of the people".
- lawn 7y ago
  Record a video of you voting. It's pretty easy to conceal it if you want to. Or have a person follow you and see what you do. Which would've worked all times I've voted here in Sweden.
  - monocasa 7y ago
    That's not really scalable though. A few people might be able to get away with those schemes, but a few people generally isn't enough to swing an election.
kortilla 7y ago
Yes, multiple times for multiple different candidates because there is no way to prove who you voted for. There is a reason nobody does this in practice.
delecti 7y ago
There's no way to verify you voted a certain way, making buying votes less reliable.
- dfxm12 7y ago
  Yes, but the question was about the ability to sell, not verifying the reliability of people who engage in this type of illegal activity.
InitialLastName 7y ago
You can't meaningfully sell your vote unless you can prove you voted a certain way. I'm certainly not going to pay you to vote the way I want without proof of delivery.
mbesto 7y ago
Please explain? It's not currently technically possible to provide proof that you voted for a specific person and thus making it impossible to buy votes. The fact that you cannot personally verify whether your vote gets counted is a feature, not a bug.
- dfxm12 7y ago
  You're making this false assumption that proof of voting a certain way is a requirement to sell or buy a vote in the first place. It's not.

wittrock 7y ago

There are some ways to do this on paper ballots! They aren't foolproof, but provide optional verification of votes without relying on electronic voting. An example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scantegrity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scantegrity