One effect of this is to create a big discontinuity at 18 years, out of all proportion to the marginal increase in knowledge and wisdom. One option would be to have the peak later, as a rough sum of the knowledge curve and the incentive curve, e.g.:
An alternative fix would be to give parents of minor children extra votes. This would aim to exploit the fact that parents typically exhibit really high levels of altruism towards their children, so arguably actually have longer-term horizons than childless 18yr olds despite lower life expectancy. We see this behaviour in voting through parents apparent obsession with good schools and safety for their children. So we might have something like:
Here is a new law paper on the subject, arguing that giving votes to kids (via their parents) is desirable and legally tractable:
Many of America’s most significant policy problems, from failing schools to the aftershocks of COVID shutdowns to national debt to climate change, share a common factor: the weak political power of children. Children are 23% of all citizens; they have distinct interests; and they already count for electoral districting. But because they lack the maturity to vote for themselves, their interests don’t count proportionally at the polls. The result is policy that observably disserves children’s interests and violates a deep principle of democratic fairness: that citizens, through voting, can make political power respond to their interests.
Yet there’s a fix. We should entrust children’s interests in the voting booth to the same people we entrust with those interests everywhere else: their parents. Voting parents should be able to cast proxy ballots on behalf of their minor children. So should the court-appointed guardians of those who can’t vote due to mental incapacity. This proposal would be pragmatically feasible, constitutionally permissible, and breathtakingly significant: perhaps no single intervention would, at a stroke, more profoundly alter the incentives of American parties and politicians. And, crucially, it would be entirely a matter of state law. Giving parents the vote is a reform that any state can adopt, both for its own elections and for its representation in Congress and the Electoral College.
Thanks for writing this! I found it very interesting, and certainly far above most EA posts about politics.
One effect of this is to create a big discontinuity at 18 years, out of all proportion to the marginal increase in knowledge and wisdom. One option would be to have the peak later, as a rough sum of the knowledge curve and the incentive curve, e.g.:
An alternative fix would be to give parents of minor children extra votes. This would aim to exploit the fact that parents typically exhibit really high levels of altruism towards their children, so arguably actually have longer-term horizons than childless 18yr olds despite lower life expectancy. We see this behaviour in voting through parents apparent obsession with good schools and safety for their children. So we might have something like:
Thanks! I also do favour a tapering-in system, if I had to guess now. And I think that surrogacy voting is pretty interesting, too.
Here is a new law paper on the subject, arguing that giving votes to kids (via their parents) is desirable and legally tractable: