Truth2Know
Gold Member
- Dec 18, 2014
- 353
- 197
- 190
The one-person, one-vote philosophy used in America needs to be changed. The functions performed by elected officials are too important to entrust candidate selection to people on the sole basis they are citizens of a certain age. This simplistic voting condition causes pandering to buy voter support. An earned voting privilege system needs to be implemented before those only taking from the government, and the candidates they support, damage America more than they already have.
Let’s use a criterion similar to what companies use to determine eligible voters for company issues. If you own one share of stock in a company, you get one vote. Those with more money invested in a company get more votes. This is straight forward and equitable.
For political office voting, the metric corresponding to owning stock shares in a company is the amount “contributed” to government operations, i.e. taxes. The more you pay in taxes, the more heavily weighted your vote should be.
Because the top 1% of earners pay about 35% of all income taxes and the top 5% pay about 57%, it is unrealistic to think that a direct correlation to a company’s “one share, one vote” method could, or even should, be attempted. It would be unwise to give so much voting power to so few, even though they are graciously funding most of our country’s operations.
One approach is to use a combination of Federal income and social insurance taxes paid when setting a voting threshold. The threshold could be a percentage (50% is used for this example) of the average income and social insurance taxes paid. This would give voting privileges to people that are contributing at least something to our country’s operation. Here are some calculations that show what an “average” tax amount looks like: Who pays their fair share of Federal taxes US Message Board - Political Discussion Forum.
In this proposal, people paying taxes at or above threshold receive one vote. For example, those paying 50% of the average income and social insurance taxes, all the way up to the highest tax payer, get one vote. Those paying less than threshold receive a proportionate fraction of a vote, rounded up to the nearest tenth of a vote. Pay 48.2% of threshold, get 0.5 of a vote; pay only $1 in taxes, get 0.1 of a vote. Pay nothing (or less) in Federal income tax or social insurance tax, no vote for you. Filing jointly? Just divide the total taxes paid by two to determine how each person compares to threshold.
Is it fair to have adult citizens living in the United States and not allow them vote because they are not financially supporting the country? Yes. Even though they can’t vote, they still receive the benefits of living in this country. It is like non-stock holding customers of an electric company. They enjoy electricity generated by the company (if their bills are paid), but have no say in how the company is run. They should be happy their lights are on. If people pay nothing in taxes but want to vote, they know what to do.
If stock shares can be voted online and taxes paid online, the technology is available to implement this political office voting system. As a bonus, think how convenient it would be to vote online. Let’s make this change before it is too late.
Let’s use a criterion similar to what companies use to determine eligible voters for company issues. If you own one share of stock in a company, you get one vote. Those with more money invested in a company get more votes. This is straight forward and equitable.
For political office voting, the metric corresponding to owning stock shares in a company is the amount “contributed” to government operations, i.e. taxes. The more you pay in taxes, the more heavily weighted your vote should be.
Because the top 1% of earners pay about 35% of all income taxes and the top 5% pay about 57%, it is unrealistic to think that a direct correlation to a company’s “one share, one vote” method could, or even should, be attempted. It would be unwise to give so much voting power to so few, even though they are graciously funding most of our country’s operations.
One approach is to use a combination of Federal income and social insurance taxes paid when setting a voting threshold. The threshold could be a percentage (50% is used for this example) of the average income and social insurance taxes paid. This would give voting privileges to people that are contributing at least something to our country’s operation. Here are some calculations that show what an “average” tax amount looks like: Who pays their fair share of Federal taxes US Message Board - Political Discussion Forum.
In this proposal, people paying taxes at or above threshold receive one vote. For example, those paying 50% of the average income and social insurance taxes, all the way up to the highest tax payer, get one vote. Those paying less than threshold receive a proportionate fraction of a vote, rounded up to the nearest tenth of a vote. Pay 48.2% of threshold, get 0.5 of a vote; pay only $1 in taxes, get 0.1 of a vote. Pay nothing (or less) in Federal income tax or social insurance tax, no vote for you. Filing jointly? Just divide the total taxes paid by two to determine how each person compares to threshold.
Is it fair to have adult citizens living in the United States and not allow them vote because they are not financially supporting the country? Yes. Even though they can’t vote, they still receive the benefits of living in this country. It is like non-stock holding customers of an electric company. They enjoy electricity generated by the company (if their bills are paid), but have no say in how the company is run. They should be happy their lights are on. If people pay nothing in taxes but want to vote, they know what to do.
If stock shares can be voted online and taxes paid online, the technology is available to implement this political office voting system. As a bonus, think how convenient it would be to vote online. Let’s make this change before it is too late.
