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Notes -
On giving parents votes for their children
One idea that people here have mentioned a couple of times has been to give parents a vote for each underage child they have. The more I think about it, the better this proposal seems, and not only just that, but almost everyone, no matter where they are on the political spectrum should find something in it they support.
Firstly on the logistics front this is very simple to implement. We already have a database of who is the legal parent of who, and whether or not they are emancipated from their parents. Every non-emancipated child's parents get a ballot paper in a different colour to the standard one (say a green ballot paper vs white for adults) which is worth half of a normal vote. So overall both parents of a child get half an extra vote that they can use to vote as they wish. Then we can just count the votes after the election, giving 1/2 weighting to the green ballots. If you have 4 children you are legally the parent of (and responsible for), then you get 1 white and 4 green ballots every election, totally to 3 full votes. Any emancipated children get their full vote, as they are already considered adults for many other things.
This method removes the argument that children shouldn't get a vote because they aren't well developed enough to choose themselves what they want. We already trust parents to act in their child's best interest for many things, asking parents to vote for them as well isn't much of a stretch beyond this. It also rewards parents for sticking with their children and raising them well, as you only get to vote on their behalf if you accept responsibility for them.
The consequences of such a policy would be very positive. Firstly the greater political power handed to parents over non-parents would lead to policies favouring those with children, which would help increase the abysmal birth rates of many western countries as having a child becomes more beneficial/less of a burden. Parents are generally considered as having more stake in the long term future of society too, so giving greater political power to them would shift society towards more long term thinking too, which is sorely lacking at the moment.
Parents tend to be more conservative than childless people, controlling for all the usual factors. Giving them extra voting power would almost certainly shift the Overton window rightwards. Expect to see greater focus on tackling crime, nicer neighbourhoods and better schools if such a policy comes to pass.
At the moment the age of the median voter is significantly higher than the average age of the population as whole. This leads to greater emphasis being placed on the concerns of the old disproportionately, see for example the UK where attacking the entitlements of the old (pensions, high house prices etc.) is effectively a no-go area, as whichever party does this is certain to take a drubbing at the next election. Giving children the vote via their parents would fix this issue, the age of the median voter (controlled for vote power) would come down a fair bit, thus shifting political focus away from the concerns of the old towards the concerns of those of childbearing age.
Equally at the moment in many western countries due to demographic differences in age cohorts minorities have significantly less voting power than you would expect given their share of the population. This is due to minorities being disproportionately minors (pun not intended) who don't get the vote. Thus current political focus is disproportionately focused on placating whites. Such a change would hand more power to minorities in the country allowing them to push for policies that are best for themselves and their children, rather than just what white progressives say are best for themselves and their children. Doing this basically just pushes the voting demographics of a country forward by 18 years, it's going to happen anyways, might as well just accept it now even if you are white.
And children themselves probably benefit the most from such a policy. Parents generally put great emphasis on giving the best possible start to their children, and many already vote accordingly to what they believe is going to be best for them. Amplifying their voices relative to the childless will probably lead to these children entering a world more suited for them when they reach adulthood than presently.
Basically no matter whether you are conservative or liberal, white or a minority, young or old, giving votes to the parents of children is a policy that has something to offer you.
This is why I'm against it.
If I could, I would prevent everyone under that $25K threshold from voting at all. These people are basically wards of the state, their opinions are not relevant or useful. The only reason that allowing them to vote makes any sense to me at all is that it may promote stability by giving the poor a sense that they are politically represented. The last thing I want to do is reward them with additional votes because they had children that they can't pay for.
Regarding speculation that this scheme may raise fertility rates, I would regard that as unproven, to put it mildly. I would prefer some country that isn't my own try it out so there's at least some experimental result to go on. In practice, I would expect the actual outcome to just increase the rate of dysgenic policies.
What are your views on requiring people who make under 25K and whose opinions are not relevant or useful, to have to obey laws?
To riff on Ghandi, I think that would be a good idea.
LMAO, that's an excellent comeback.
It's not as good a comeback as you think. Even though the underclass has a higher rate of lawbreaking, that doesn't mean that so many of them are lawbreaking that there are none left who aren't. Why don't you want that portion of them to have a say in the laws that they have to obey?
The Right is allowed to say cities are hell hole slums, that they hate NY city values, and that people making less than 25k are lawless leeches who should be disenfranchised because they're the party of the real working class fighting back against elites who disparage deplorables.
If I assumed they said that, I would be putting words into people's mouths.
Walterodim said he wanted to strip the vote of people making less than 25k because they're basically wards of that state. Romney said 47% of the country is dependent on the government. Ted Cruz famously disparaged New York City values in the 2016 primary. Marjorie Taylor Greene called New York filthy and disgusting.
I suppose I'm conflating all these politicians (and one random commenter) with "the right", but it is an interesting phenomenon that open disparagement of cities and low income people is acceptable on the right at the same time they claim to be anti-elite populist crusaders.
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