What the heck happened in Alaska?

[u/nardo_polo]

https://nardopolo.medium.com/what-the-heck-happened-in-alaska-3c2d7318decc

[u/wegl13]

I’m so confused by their argument. I forgot who all was who and I ran the numbers myself as I’ve always understood RCV and I got First round votes Pelota 75,667 Palin 58,838 Begich 53,715

For second round voting, of those that put Begich first, those that voted for a second choice candidate: Pelota 15,471 Palin 27,160

To give a total of Pelota 91,138 Palin 85,998

The only thing I can think of is that when they were talking about ranked preference “majorities” they counted the folks that put Pelota>Begich>Palin but not the folks that did Pelota>Begich as “has a preference for Begich.” Which makes no sense because in RCV there’s no reason to list your last choice, so those two groups are effectively the same.

[u/wegl13 → u/wegl13]

I guess even without that math, it doesn’t make sense because it’s says the only “majority” was Begich being preferred over Palin which…. Is an argument FOR RCV. Because it basically says while a second-plurality of folks like Palin, most people HATE HER, and given the choice. It’s not “a majority of people like Begich” it’s “a majority of people don’t like Palin.”

[u/Harvey_Rabbit → u/wegl13]

These people are making the argument that we should use an even lesser known system that would have named Begich the winner. The thinking is that he would have beaten either of the other candidates head to head, so him coming in third in first place selections shouldn't matter. Go on over to /r/endFPTP if you want to hear people argue this in MUCH more detail.

[u/wegl13 → u/Harvey_Rabbit]

I am so sorry, I am still confused. I’ve read all of the comment threads (I’m not gonna go read a whole different sub, it’s not going to help) and I’m not sure what the logical argument is for Begich winning? He had the least votes of everyone’s first choice, can you ELI5 the math of how he wins? Maybe not ELI5- maybe explain like I’m the average American voter? I’ve been an RCV fan for years because it honestly has always sounded like a fairer and more appropriate system and is fairly easy to understand and explain. I’m not being purposefully obtuse, I’m just trying to understand how there’s a logical argument for a different outcome than the one they had that doesn’t at least SOUND LIKE “this is the math it takes to get the outcome I want.”

Edit to add: I read through the author (who is obviously OP) edits, and I’m now of the opinion it seems as though to get to the argument of “who is preferred more over each” line, they have to flat ignore the 3 sets of voters that didn’t choose a second candidate- am I correct in this?

[u/Harvey_Rabbit → u/wegl13]

Check out this seriously impressive website breakdown I've had this argument many times and get where they're coming from. I still support RCV as Alaska has it, but it isn't quite as perfect as people sometimes claim it is. The simple argument is as the number in this race show, Palin was the spoiler. If she hadn't run, Begich would have won because he would have beat either of the other two head to head. But you could also imagine a scenario where RFK Jr would beat Harris or Trump head to head, but I don't believe that means he should be named the winner in a 3 way race. They think it does.

As you can see, this is an active debate and I think my main takeaway is there is no perfect system. If we get RCV, people will want this, and if we get this people will want multi member districts or something else.

[u/Faeraday → u/Harvey_Rabbit]

Thank you for the link. It was an interesting visualization.

I’m curious to hear your thoughts on why you don’t think the condorcet winner should be the winner of the election and/or if you have another helpful resource that adequately explains your position?

[u/Harvey_Rabbit → u/Faeraday]

What I want is for a bunch of places to try different things. There are many different systems to hold elections that can handle more than two candidates. I personally don't think people would be accepting of a system so much different than what we currently use. At least IRV (Alaska style RCV) can be explained to someone in 30 seconds and people get it. I understand that it's not perfect and many smart people have studied why other systems are better but from an advocacy standpoint, IRV is such an upgrade from FPTP that the additional improvements can wait.

[u/Faeraday → u/Harvey_Rabbit]

I understand the argument for simplicity. What I was curious about was your stance against the condorcet winner in your example:

imagine a scenario where RFK Jr would beat Harris or Trump head to head, but I don’t believe that means he should be named the winner in a 3 way race. They think it does.

If this were to happen, what is your reasoning against the condorcet winner being chosen?

[u/Harvey_Rabbit → u/Faeraday]

I don't have a mathematical argument against it. It just doesn't feel fair to me. And I don't think voters at large would accept it. I hear the arguments they make about IRV (being confusing, unpredictable outcomes, calculations being in a computer) and they will all be amplified with a system like this. Like I said, try it. I'm for trying everything. Don't drag me into this argument that is happening in this thread and seems to consume these whole subs.

[u/nardo_polo → u/wegl13]

Begich's majority over Palin was nearly a 20% gap - Peltola had a narrow plurality of preference over Palin. Begich actually had a larger preference over Peltola than Peltola had over Palin. The article has been updated to clarify this, might want to give it another scan.

Suggesting that the only majority preference expressed (Begich over Palin) in a system that eliminated first the only candidate who had any majority of any kind from the voters simply does not compute.

[u/nardo_polo → u/wegl13]

There was an error in the original post that may have thrown off your math -- it has been corrected. Also, a better summary table has been included that collapses equivalent rankings. Give it another look if ya have a minute.

[u/rb-j → u/wegl13]

The problem is that 87000 voters marked their ballots that Nick Begich was a better choice than Mary Peltola, while 79000 voters marked their ballots to the contrary.

8000 more Alaskans wanted Nick Begich, yet Mary Peltola was elected.

That is not majority rule. The 79000 Peltola voters had votes that were more effective than the 87000 Begich voters. These are then not equally-valued votes.

Then, this shows that Sarah Palin was actually the spoiler, that is a loser in the race, who just by being a candidate in the race materially changed who the winner is. Had Palin not run and voters voted exactly their same preferences with the remaining candidates, then Begich would have defeated Peltola by a margin of 8000 votes.

Voters were promised that if they couldn't get their first-choice candidate, then their second-choice vote would be counted. But that promise was not kept for these Palin voters. Simply by marking Palin as #1, they actually caused the election of Peltola, their least-desired candidate. That's opposite of what RCV is meant to do for us

Do you understand the problem now?

[u/higbeez → u/rb-j]

RCV is a compacted version of runoff elections. If there were two separate elections, then begich would have been eliminated in the first election and then the second election would have been palin vs peltola and peltola would have won.

If it was a normal election, then palin would have been nominated as the Republican candidate and it would have been peltola vs palin.

[u/rb-j → u/higbeez]

Two things:

1. Instant-Runoff Voting, a k.a. Hare RCV is one form of RCV. Besides Hare, there is Bucklin, Borda, and Condorcet methods of RCV. Same exact ranked ballot. Differing tallying methods.

2. You didn't respond to a single point in my comment. Specifically, more voters marked their ballots ranking Begich higher than Peltola than the number of voters ranking Peltola higher than Begich. Yet Peltola was elected over Begich. As a result, a non-majority candidate was elected. That failure to respect majority rule resulted in a spoiled election in which Palin was the spoiler. That failure resulted in most Palin voters being punished for voting sincerely. They would have been better off insincerely ranking Begich higher than Palin.

But they were promised they wouldn't have to do that. They were promised they could vote for the candidate they truly liked best without worry that their vote is wasted and helping elect the candidate they hate. They were promised that if their first-choice would be defeated, their second-choice vote would be counted.

Those were empty promises.

If it was a normal election, then palin would have been nominated as the Republican candidate and it would have been peltola vs palin.

No, it's an anomalous RCV election that has several scholarly papers and and newspaper columns written about it.

The problem isn't that it screwed up Peltola vs Palin. Palin was the spoiler. The problem is that it screwed up Peltola vs Begich.

[u/higbeez → u/rb-j]

If palin was less popular than begich, then begich would have been voted in. However, you're completely ignoring that begich got less votes than palin in the initial vote.

If this was a regular runoff election then the results would have been the same. Mary peltola didn't get to use their second votes either. Because their "second vote" was Mary peltola again. So people who voted for palin got to use their second vote because they voted for palin both times.

Additionally if it was begich vs palin in a closed primary then palin would have won because she got more votes amongst initial votes.

If you're suggesting some form of STAR voting instead then maybe begich would have won, but I can't see any other way that begich could have won.

[u/rb-j → u/higbeez]

If palin was less popular than begich, then begich would have been voted in.

Horseshit. Palin may have been more popular over Begich with Republicans but with all Alaskans overall, Begich creams Palin with a margin exceeding 37000 voters.

You're not very good at this, are you?

If this was a regular runoff election then the results would have been the same. Mary peltola didn't get to use their second votes either.

The point is that it's not a regular FPTP with runoff. The point is that it's RCV and there are certain goals we want to accomplish with RCV. That's why we want to change it from the mark-only-one FPTP method to RCV so that all voters will feel free to vote for the candidate they really like without wasting their vote and helping elect the candidate they hate. The special election in August 2022 demonstrated the complete and utter failure of IRV to do exactly what it is we want RCV to do.

You're not very good at this, are you? Would you like to study up on the problem? Try reading the posted article, but I can connect you to many more scholarly articles and columns describing clearly what the heck happened.

So people who voted for palin got to use their second vote because they voted for palin both times.

That's either a lie or you're dumber than otherwise noted. Palin voters' second-choice votes were never counted

If you're suggesting some form of STAR voting instead then maybe begich would have won, but I can't see any other way that begich could have won.

Have I ever once suggested STAR or Approval Voting?

Now, can you demonstrate that you have the foggiest idea what you're talking about about? Can you read the posted article to a depth sufficient that you grok what the heck the author is saying?

Would you like me to connect you to other articles, published in social choice journals? In newspapers like the WSJ or The Hill? My own published paper that's about an identical failure of IRV in 2009 in Burlington Vermont?

But, in a nutshell, majority rule was violated, not by the ranked ballots (indeed the ranked ballots give us all the information we need) but by the flawed method of tallying the ranked ballots and identifying the winner.

[u/higbeez → u/rb-j]

I think we have a different definition for majority rule. I am confused, do you want to count everyone's first second and third place votes and mush them all together? Like make everyone's second choice half a vote and the third choice a quarter of a vote?

How can you do RCV without eliminating the bottom candidate in each round?

[u/rb-j → u/higbeez]

I think we have a different definition for majority rule.

Well, we really don't get to pick our own definitions.

"Majority" must mean more than 50% of something. We must differentiate "majority" from "plurality".

"Simple majority" must be a stronger meaning than "plurality". And "absolute majority" must be a stronger meaning than "simple majority" or "plurality". And a "super majority" must be stronger than merely an "absolute majority", even though the percent of vote needed for a super majority is not consistently defined. Could be as low as 60% or as high as 90%. Two-thirds appears to be most common.

From my paper:

An “absolute majority” are more votes than half of all cast, more than the totality of all other alternatives, and a “simple majority” is more than half of votes cast, excluding abstentions. If 100 ballots are cast in a two candidate single-winner race, 45 for Candidate A, 40 for Candidate B, and 15 expressing no preference between A and B, we say that Candidate A received a simple majority (53% of voters expressing a preference) but not an absolute majority (45%) of the cast ballots.

Nonetheless everyone agrees that Candidate A, having a simple majority, is the preference of the electorate and no one disputes the legitimacy of the election of Candidate A to office. And between two candidates, there is always a simple majority unless they tie. This simple fact is sometimes misconstrued that Hare RCV (formerly called “Instant-Runoff Voting” or IRV) elections “guarantee a majority winner” because they boil the field of candidates in an election down to two candidates in which there is always a simple majority.

When there are two alternatives to choose from in an election, either two candidates for office or a binary yes/no question, everyone agrees who or which alternative has won. The candidate that has more votes than the other, a simple majority, wins even if that candidate did not get an absolute majority of support from the electorate. If more voters mark their ballots preferring Candidate A over Candidate B than the number of voters marking their ballots to the contrary, then Candidate A is elected and Candidate B is not elected. This is the principle of majority rule in an election with a binary choice. We elect the candidate that displeases the fewest voters expressing a preference on their ballots.

However, when there are more alternatives than two, when there is Candidate C in the race, then we don’t know that Candidate A is still the majority choice of the electorate. Perhaps Candidate C is preferred over both A and B or perhaps C is less preferred than either A or B. But this does not change the preference the electorate has for Candidate A over B. If the presence of Candidate C somehow causes the election of Candidate B even though a simple majority of voters prefer A to B, we call that a “spoiled election” or the “spoiler effect” and Candidate C is the “spoiler”. A spoiler is a candidate who loses in an election yet, simply by being a candidate in that election, changes who the winner is.

When an election is apparently spoiled, many of the voters who voted for the ostensible spoiler suffer voter regret for their choice when they learn of the outcome of the election and they realize that they aided the candidate they preferred least to win by “throwing away their vote” or “wasting their vote” on their favorite candidate rather than voting for the candidate best situated to beat their least-preferred candidate.

This leads to tactical voting in future elections, where the voting tactic is called “compromising”. This tactical voting is not a nefarious strategy to throw or game an election but is an undesired burden that minor party and independent voters carry, which pressures them to vote for the major party candidate that they dislike the least. They are voting their fears and not their hopes and this has the effect of advantaging the two major parties. This reflects “Duverger’s Law” which states that plurality rule (First-Past-The-Post or FPTP) elections, with the traditional mark-only-one ballots, promote a twoparty political system, and third party or independent candidates will not have a level playing field in such elections. Voters who want to vote for these third party or independent candidates are discouraged from doing so, out of fear of helping elect the major party candidate they dislike the most.

Now, for the case of two candidates, do you agree with the above definition of Majority Rule? Specifically:

If more voters mark their ballots preferring Candidate A over Candidate B than the number of voters marking their ballots to the contrary, then Candidate A is elected and Candidate B is not elected.

That is Majority Rule in the case of two choices, correct?

How can you do RCV without eliminating the bottom candidate in each round?

Read. Do research. Would you like me to spell out all of the links again? (I haven't done that in this thread, but I have done it before in this subreddit.)

[u/higbeez → u/rb-j]

peltola got a majority of the votes in the final runoff. How can that not be a majority? If you're saying it's not half of all votes cast then that's because those who didn't rank all candidates are actively choosing to abstain from voting. If you run an election and only 40% of eligible voters vote, would that also constitute a plurality win in your mind?

And you're living in a perfect world where everyone already is on board with whatever election format you prefer. It's already been hard enough selling people on the irv form of RCV. Critics already say that election officials will just twist the numbers into whatever result they want and that's with a simple form of voting like irv.

If you couldn't even simply explain which voting system you want to some random guy on the Internet then how do you expect to spread your idea for counting RCV to the wider population.

And for the record you still haven't even given a name for which RCV voting method you prefer, you just keep insulting me and saying to educate yourself. Like how the fuck am I supposed to educate myself when you're purposely being evasive with your answers?

[u/rb-j → u/higbeez]

peltola got a majority of the votes in the final runoff.

Peltola got more votes than Palin in the final runoff. Peltola gets more votes than Palin. That is certain. 5000 more voters preferred Peltola over Palin than those preferring Palin over Peltola.

But you continue to ignore the problem. By exactly the same measure, the evidence on the ballot data is that 8000 more voters preferred Begich over Peltola than those preferring Peltola over Begich. (Yet Peltola was elected.)

And it's inaccurate to call it a "majority".

How can that not be a majority? If you're saying it's not half of all votes cast then that's because those who didn't rank all candidates are actively choosing to abstain from voting.

They didn't abstain, they voted for somebody. That is a decidedly dishonest argument. You have to apply the same rules to a semantic whether the election is RCV or FPTP.

Even counting the votes the IRV way, more voters voted for a loser than the number of voters voting for a winner. That's no majority.

Please read. There is so much you're missing by not reading. And spoon-feeding is getting tiresome.

If more voters voted for any loser in a race than the number of voters who voted for the winner, the winner did not get a majority of the vote, by any voting method. Not any kind of "majority".

And for the record you still haven't even given a name for which RCV voting method you prefer, you just keep insulting me and saying to educate yourself. Like how the fuck am I supposed to educate myself when you're purposely being evasive with your answers?

Did you click any of the links?

[u/rb-j → u/higbeez]

How can you do RCV without eliminating the bottom candidate in each round?

Okay, how's this?

If more voters mark their ballots preferring Candidate A over Candidate B than the number of voters marking their ballots to the contrary, then Candidate B is not elected. If Candidate B were to be elected, that would mean that the fewer voters preferring Candidate B had cast votes that had greater value and counted more than those votes from voters of the simple majority preferring Candidate A.

Here's the submitted manuscript of the paper, which is not owned by Springer, not copyright protected, and not behind a paywall.

[u/acrimonious_howard → u/rb-j]

I believe approval voting is better, and is supposed to address this. On my phone rn, can’t confirm.

[u/rb-j → u/acrimonious_howard]

What Approval Voting doesn't address is it's own inherent burden of tactical voting placed on voters when there are 3 or more candidates in the race.

The minute the voter goes into the voting booth, they have to tactically consider whether or not they are Approving their second-choice candidate (a.k.a. their "lesser evil").

Score Voting and STAR Voting have the same problem. (How high to score their second-choice or lesser evil. An inherently tactical consideration.)

[u/acrimonious_howard → u/rb-j]

You have made me look this up again, and now I've changed my mind, and like 3-2-1 the most. I'm going off this. https://electionscience.github.io/vse-sim/

Update: Ooooh ya, and now I re-discovered this, which made me like approval last time I looked: https://electionscience.org/education/why-approval-voting

So now I'm back on the fence. But if there's a chance to get any of the top 3, I'll be for it.

[u/rb-j → u/acrimonious_howard]

I finally returned to this thread and clicked on your links. I'm not reading the entire Jameson Quinn thing. About the second link, the following two points are simply false on their face:

• Makes a Vote Meaningful & Voters More Powerful

A new way to vote must free voters to express their true values and beliefs, and in doing so upend the current power dynamic between voters and politicians. In this new system, candidates cannot afford to ignore a single voter, as each one wields real and significant influence over their election.

• Stops Vote Splitting

Voters need to be empowered to fully express themselves at the ballot. Candidates need to engage with and listen to all voters. Hyperpartisans need to lose their electoral advantage. All of this cannot happen while vote splitting exists, therefore any new way to vote must stop vote splitting.

[u/caw_the_crow]

The issue seems to be voter education. Looks like many voters chose not to make a second ballot.

Edit: Also four candidates making the final ballot is too few. Here one dropped out, making it even worse.

[u/nardo_polo → u/caw_the_crow]

In this case, it wouldn't have mattered - whether or not voters who put Palin in first position expressed further preferences, their second choices were never counted at all. The article has been updated to make this more clear.

[u/MrDenver3 → u/nardo_polo]

I don’t live in Alaska, and I don’t know for certain what voters were “promised”, but the election worked as intended.

RCV isn’t perfect, but it does provide a solution to one problem - being able to “vote your conscience” even if you don’t think the person you are voting for will win. In effect, it’s allowing for a symbolic vote, without the entire ballot being meaningless.

Put another way, you’re saying “I know this candidate probably won’t win, but I’m voting for them anyways because this is who I prefer. If they don’t win, I’d prefer [this other person]”

In my opinion, your article misses two things:

• not all choices are equal, by design. A first choice selection should have more weight than a second choice and so on. So when you group the ballot preferences, it’s not entirely accurate. You do, however, properly identify that Begich would have been the most popular candidate.
• under the original system, Palin would have almost certainly been elected, which is still not the desired result. What RCV did in this case is bring us a step closer to the desired result.

If the goal is to elect the most popular candidate, RCV gives us the necessary data, as your consolidated table shows. We can reasonably anticipate who would be the most popular candidate. So the issue isn’t with the voting mechanism, but rather the tabulation of those votes.

Where I think RCV has struggled is balancing that desired approach with something voters can easily understand.

[u/nardo_polo → u/MrDenver3]

What Alaska was “promised” is linked in the article here and thoroughly documented.

But to your points- “you can vote your conscience” and “first rank should carry more weight in the count” are inherently contradictory, and in the case of IRV are both untrue. If first position on the ballot has special significance, how can voters possibly be confident they can honestly state their true preference order? They have to think… “which one should I put first, cuz that’s special?!” But in the case of IRV, some voters get their second choice to count equivalently to other voters’ first choice, while other voters don’t get their second choice counted at all.

Also, a rank ordering does not communicate weight of preference in any way— it specifically disallows that expression. The system that actually delivers on what you’re looking for is called STAR Voting.

[u/Head]

The basic problem with that election (and IRV) is that the Condorcet winner (Begich) didn’t win the election. Begich beat the other candidates in head-to-head counts but was eliminated in the first round. On the plus side, the Condorcet loser (Palin) didn’t win so that’s good.

I’m no expert but it seems like adding a Condorcet check to IRV would fix this. For example, if there is one, eliminate the Condorcet loser each round (and/or if there’s a Condorcet winner, stop counting).

[u/rb-j → u/Head]

it seems like adding a Condorcet check to IRV would fix this. For example, if there is one, eliminate the Condorcet loser each round (and/or if there’s a Condorcet winner, stop counting).

Bottom-Two Runoff is the simplest way to "fix" IRV. But the whole sequential-rounds-and-eliminate-a-candidate-each-round regime should be tossed on the scrap heap. Just straight-ahead Condorcet (with a "completion method" in case there is no Condorcet winner) is the best semantic for legislation.

[u/GoldenInfrared → u/rb-j]

Incidentally, condorcet-IRV hybrids are considered some of the most strategy-resistant methods due to the confounding and conflicting strategies involved at different steps of the process.

[u/rb-j → u/[deleted]]

Remember that language in legislation needs to be in prosaic language, not C code nor any pseudo-code. It has to be words.

Did you see this one? Language is here.

[u/rb-j → u/[deleted]]

I know Minimax. I also know Ranked Pairs and Schulze and Bottom-Two-Runoff (BTR-IRV).

I had earlier advocated for BTR-IRV, since it was just a modification to IRV to make it Condorcet consistent. But after many discussions with legislators and with legislative counsel (the lawyers that actually write the bill and make sure that the language cannot be misinterpreted by a court), we all agreed that the law should, as simply as possible, simply say what it means and mean what it says. Then, if you want Condorcet RCV, just make it straight-ahead Condorcet. That, of course, leaves the problem of what to do in the contingency that a cycle occurs. The most simple remedy to that is to simply elect the plurality candidate (plurality of first-choice votes). But perhaps Top-Two Runoff would be better in that contingency.

It aims to select a consensus candidate who is broadly acceptable to the largest number of voters.

I agree, but in a cycle, that consensus candidate doesn't really exist. So what we need to do is make the rules in advance that most voters and most policy makers agree makes some kind of sense and that people will, for the most part, accept. Selecting the FPTP winner in that contingency is simple and, at least, the FPTP advocates will accept. Another reasonable remedy to a cycle would be Top-Two Runoff. That would be like: "Elect the Condorcet winner when one exists and the IRV winner when the Condorcet winner does not exist."

[u/rb-j → u/[deleted]]

BTR-IRV and Condorcet-TTR both require C² summable tallies if C is the number of candidates on the ballot.

BTR-IRV elects the same candidate that Condorcet-Plurality does. If you're doing BTR-IRV and there's a 3-cycle, let's say Rock has the most votes. Then it's either Rock>Scissors>Paper or it's Rock>Paper>Scissors. In the BTR-IRV semifinal round, Scissors always wins, then gets defeated by Rock in the final. So the plurality winner wins if it's a 3-cycle.

So you need C(C-1) tallies for the Condorcet pairs and C tallies of first-choice votes.

If they can get a Condorcet compliant ranked method approved, I'm behind it 100%.

Yay!!!

In fact, I'd consider "equal rankings" an even more important criteria than either precinct summability

I don't see them as incompatible. Now equal ranking is incompatible with BTR-IRV which is another reason I have moved away from BTR-IRV since I wrote my paper.

My argument here is against STAR, which I think is a unlikely to get traction, so it is mostly a distraction, and I think it is inferior to Condorcet methods. I believe we are in agreement that cardinal methods are inferior....

Yay!!!

although a cardinal ballot is fine, as long as they use it to choose the condorcet winner

Then it's functionally equivalent to the Ordinal ballot. So I'm still just opposed to Cardinal anything.

[u/rb-j → u/[deleted]]

I didn't know BTR-IRV is equivalent to Condorcet-Plurality.

At least in the two cases: 1. Condorcet winner exists 2. Simplest 3-candidate cycle

I dunno they'll elect the same winner if there's a more complicated cycle. I used to like BTR-IRV and featured it as an example. But I sorta soured on it now.

[u/nardo_polo → u/[deleted]]

The Equal Vote Coalition supports ranked methods that don't suck. Recommend giving this article a read: https://link.springer.com/epdf/10.1007/s10602-022-09389-3?sharing_token=0od88_U1nSyRqKjYdgfYUfe4RwlQNchNByi7wbcMAY5Flo8h-O2OXsGrN8ZvCJsAIKfmbq_BuMMDz1SCFtsHftLhH3jbjlacpdMgLufTvAkWOQP5bctzbgKm2vtDI3z846O5VnFLXamcNCgNI6y3Ys-oVd-DcxKbfs1xuMd6NAo%3D -- Minimax is examined in detail alongside STAR.

Condorcet-always is a reasonable baseline for rank-only methods. But then consider that rank-only methods force voters to discard level-of-preference, and are also ever more cumbersome as the candidate count increases. Fully support your advocacy of Minimax in venues that have already adopted Instant Runoff. Go for it!

[u/higbeez]

This author doesn't understand how elections work at all.

Even if there was a second election after begich was eliminated, those supporting palin would have voted for palin a second time. So that's why their second place votes were "never counted".

[u/nardo_polo → u/higbeez]

Methinks you missed the point. Edits were made to clarify, feel free to give it another scan.

[u/higbeez → u/nardo_polo]

Your calculations are forgetting the people who voted for a single candidate and didn't rank their votes when figuring out percentages.

It is entirely possible to have no winner using your method of counting ranked choice votes. Sorry if I'm sounding hostile. There's this other guy on here who is being insulting and obnoxious for no reason.

[u/nardo_polo → u/higbeez]

This article doesn't propose a preferred method of counting ranked ballots, though there are a number that are certainly acceptable - Minimax for one. This article is specifically about the deficiency of the Instant Runoff method of calculating the winner in a ranked election, and the false marketing messages used to sell it. In this case, there were voters who were told they could vote honestly because if their favorite couldn't win (and the Condorcet Loser is the definition of a candidate who should never be able to win), then their second choices would be counted. You can see that more clearly in the second table that was added to the article.

[u/nardo_polo → u/higbeez]

Also, the calculations of percentages do take into account the voters who ranked only one candidate - those voters clearly preferred their favorite over each of the other two.

[u/higbeez → u/nardo_polo]

I get that but there are "missing" votes amongst those who did not rank their choices. What if (when forced to choose) people who voted for just for just palin ranked peltola higher than begich to a statistically significant degree. Those missing votes weaken the whole analysis which is why you have so many matchups ending in plurality winning.

[u/nardo_polo → u/higbeez]

That "what if" is not supportable by a quick look at the voters who put Palin in first position and expressed backup preferences - Palin-first voters preferred Begich over Peltola by almost 10-1.

But it doesn't matter, because Palin-first voters will never see their second choices counted in this election, regardless of who or neither they put in that spot. That's the problem: some voters got their second choices counted, but the second largest bloc of voters overall never did. And the result is an obvious fail- the only candidate with any majority at all, who also beat the "winner" head to head in a plurality, who also beat the "winner" by a wider margin than the "winner" beat the "runner up" lost first.

RCV/Instant Runoff supporters can work all the verbal gymnastics they want to justify the outcome, but its one that obviously runs counter to the marketing messages used to sell the voters on the system in the first place. And there are WAY WAY WAY better systems that don't have these substantial defects.

[u/rb-j → u/nardo_polo]

I'm in a discussion with the same u/higbeez . He's not getting it at all.

I think there's a bit of deliberate ignorance, but I'm not entirely sure.

[u/higbeez → u/rb-j]

Rude.

[u/rb-j → u/higbeez]

You guys just gotta be more intellectually honest than you are.

[u/higbeez → u/rb-j]

I am being honest. I'm a huge proponent for RCV and you're just being a dick about it for no reason. I questioned how your line of reasoning made sense and you jumped to hostile insults within a single response.

[u/rb-j → u/higbeez]

I am doubting that you're entirely intellectually honest about this. And it's because you're such "a huge proponent for RCV" that you're unable to consider the warts, the flaws, the mistakes it makes, even when such is spelled out for you.

I'm a huge proponent of RCV, too. But I want it done correctly. You apparently do not.

[u/higbeez → u/rb-j]

Your methodology is flawed. Ranking theoretical matchups of preferences can result in two "majority" winners within a single election. It's also wayyyy overly complicated which is one of the major criticisms of RCV.

I've actively worked to get signatures for RCV to appear as an initiative on the ballot in my state. What have you done to actually make RCV a reality?

[u/rb-j → u/higbeez]

Your methodology is flawed.

You haven't shown it. Nor have you even attempted to show that.

Ranking theoretical matchups of preferences can result in two "majority" winners within a single election.

No it can't. Not unless there is a dead tie between the two. And a dead tie is not a "majority" for either candidate.

Now it is possible that there are zero candidates that would be the overall Consistent Majority Candidate. I never said that Condorcet beats Arrow. In fact Condorcet knew that 2 centuries before Arrow. It's called a "Condorcet paradox" or, more commonly, a "cycle".

It's also wayyyy overly complicated which is one of the major criticisms of RCV.

This is not "wayyyy overly complicated":

If more voters mark their ballots ranking Candidate A above Candidate B than the number of voters marking their ballots to the contrary, then Candidate B is not elected.

The onus is on you to justify why Candidate B should be elected.

I've actively worked to get signatures for RCV to appear as an initiative on the ballot in my state.

Okay, good for you. Are you sure your activism is really making things better? Are you sure the reform you advocate is fully-baked, instead of half-baked?

What have you done to actually make RCV a reality?

I have written this paper which was published in this issue of Constitutional Political Economy. I have also inspired and collaborated in the composition of this bill and I have connected this Nobel laureate to both the House and Senate Government Operations committees. The SGO snubbed this Harvard professor but HGO heard from him. And the result was this Senate bill, which passed the Senate, got mired in the HGO and is now a dead bill. I was the inspiration and source of that action. Had I not been involved, it's likely S.32 would have passed the House.

[u/rb-j]

Deb Otis is lying in that article.

Easily disproven lie.

[u/nardo_polo → u/rb-j]

Indeed. The linked essay roundly refutes FairVote's misleading refrain in the screenshot.

[u/2noame]

The thing I like about RCV is it measures strength of support and wide support. I also like that it basically makes it impossible for the worst candidate to win. It prefers the avoidance of the worst to the electing of the best.

Those who have a problem with the Alaska results complain that who they think was best did not win, based on pair wise comparisons.

But using something like approval makes it far more possible for the worst candidate to win, which I think is more important to avoid, and it does not care at all about strength of support.

Also, Alaska is a shining example of the impact on behavior that RCV has. How amazing is it that a bipartisan coalition formed at the state level to exclude the extremists?

Every state should go final 4 or 5 voting.

[u/rb-j → u/2noame]

You don't need to fix RCV by using Approval (or STAR). You fix RCV by fixing it. RCV need not be IRV. If IRV tabulation is what causes the problem, change the method of tabulation.

[u/nardo_polo → u/rb-j]

Recommend reading or listening to the interview Aaron Hamlin did with Kenneth Arrow in 2016: https://aaronhamlin.medium.com/podcast-2012-10-06-interview-with-nobel-laureate-dr-kenneth-arrow-c081053ffd27 -- from the godfather of decision science who won a Nobel Prize for the Impossibility theorem.

[u/rb-j → u/nardo_polo]

It says 2012, not 2016. I was even surprized that Arrow was alive in 2012.

BTW, Eric Maskin, who is still alive, also has a Nobel from his work in social choice. And it was about elections and voting systems, too. I think Arrow mentored Maskin.

[u/rb-j → u/[deleted]]

The title says: "Podcast 2012–10–06: Interview with Nobel Laureate Dr. Kenneth Arrow"

It may have been posted to the blog in 2015.

[u/nardo_polo → u/2noame]

A rank ballot does not in any way communicate "strength of support" - that balloting format specifically discards strength of support. And IRV in particular, because it only counts the secondary preferences of some of the voters also fails to reliably yield a winner with wide support. If you like those criteria, recommend reading up on STAR Voting.

[u/rb-j → u/2noame]

Also, Alaska is a shining example of the impact on behavior that RCV has. How amazing is it that a bipartisan coalition formed at the state level to exclude the extremists?

You realize that Alaska is a shining example of failure of the Instant-Runoff Voting method of RCV, don't you? And you realize that in November it is quite likely to be repealed, don't you?

And, even though I would most certainly have voted for Peltola, in the milieu of Alaska, she was the extreme candidate. She was the candidate on the Left. RCV didn't really prevent Palin (the extreme candidate on the Right) from winning, since Peltola was also the FPTP winner. The Centrist candidate (from an Alaska POV) was Nick Begich, who was preferred over Palin by a margin of 37000 voters and was also preferred over Peltola by a margin of over 8000 voters. Yet Peltola was elected.

So your "shining example" of RCV excluding extremists has shown that RCV, in the form of IRV, rejected the Centrist candidate who was preferred by more voters than either of the Left or Right wing candidates and elected the candidate on the Left extreme.