How Impactful is Voting?
Very, especially in a presidential election year.
According to the researchers at 80,000 Hours,
Over each four year term of a President, the US Federal Government will spend $14.8 trillion. Written out as a number that’s $14,800,000,000,000.
It’s $46,000 for each American. It’s $117,000 for each vote cast in 2012.
If you multiply all that spending through a 1 in 10 million chance of changing the outcome, it comes to $1.5 million. That’s the fraction of the budget you can ‘expect’ to influence by voting in a swing state, in a statistical sense.
Of course, much of the Federal Budget is quite stable, and mostly determined by Congress (though you can vote for Congress too). But it doesn’t have to be that flexible to be important. For example, if one party wants to spend 0.5% of GDP on foreign aid, and the other wants to spend 0.3%, one vote alone could shift – in expectation – $14,000 into foreign aid.
For those looking to increase their overall impact in the world, voting may be the way to do that. We are voting for more than an individual; we are voting for policies, economic expenditures, and the impacts of that spending. Voting for one candidate over the other has the potential to influence really big government decisions, ranging from foreign aid to spending money on wars.
Where do you want your $1.5 million to go?