I still wonder about "ground rules" for a good voting system.
Shall we stipulate that the opinion of a tenured Princeton professor should count exactly the same as that of a multiply convicted felon, and that the opinion of a 17-year-old should count for nothing?
I fear that a lot of differences in how we conduct elections can be mapped back to unstated, but highly debatable, opinions.
To give an example often quoted by J. Posner, the political opinions of parents who are raising children are known to differ quite widely from the opinions of the childless. A possible result of this is social programs that stiff children and leave a lot of them in poverty - while seniors collect generous benefits.
But this is just one example of an unstated ground rule that can be challenged.
I still wonder about "ground rules" for a good voting system.
Shall we stipulate that the opinion of a tenured Princeton professor should count exactly the same as that of a multiply convicted felon, and that the opinion of a 17-year-old should count for nothing?
I fear that a lot of differences in how we conduct elections can be mapped back to unstated, but highly debatable, opinions.
To give an example often quoted by J. Posner, the political opinions of parents who are raising children are known to differ quite widely from the opinions of the childless. A possible result of this is social programs that stiff children and leave a lot of them in poverty - while seniors collect generous benefits.
But this is just one example of an unstated ground rule that can be challenged.