Now that the mid-term elections have come and gone, we can look ahead with joy, reverence, fear, disgust or anger to the 2016 election season.
That one, of course, will be a Presidential election. With votes, and Electoral Votes.
Americans vote for a president, but only indirectly. Americans vote for electors, who elect the president. These elector guys and gals get together about a month after the election, and legally give us the final decision.
In 48 of the 50 states, the candidate who gets the most popular (individual votes) gets all the electoral votes the state possesses. Electoral votes are allocated based on state populations, with larger states getting more votes. Smaller states get a minimum of three votes, regardless of their population.
Electors are ‘pledged’ to candidates, but generally do not have a law directing them to vote for whom they are pledged. That way, if we somehow lose our minds and vote for somebody outside what the Machine produced for us, the Machine can keep control.
A bit cynical, perhaps, but a useful reminder that we do not elect a president directly in the United States.
What do states with lots of electoral votes look like, compared to those that do not?
States with more electoral votes tend to have higher Taxpayer Burdens, as calculated by Truth in Accounting.
(This chart reports the average Taxpayer Burden calculated by Truth in Accounting for states grouped by the number of electoral votes they have (on the bottom or x-axis). For example, states with only 3 to 5 electoral votes have an average Taxpayer Burden less than $5000. note: Alaska, Hawaii excluded)
Are our presidents chosen in a process dominated by states with high debt loads and poor financial reporting? Does this suggest we shouldn’t be optimistic about federal debt management and financial reporting?
Where does Illinois fit in on this score?
Illinois had 20 electoral votes in 2012, about twice the 50 state average. Illinois has been losing electoral votes in recent decades, as its population has grown significantly slower than the national average.
Illinois also has one of the highest state government debt loads in the nation, and a regrettable record in truthfully ‘balancing the budget’ in light of constitutional balanced budget requirements. Illinois falls in bucket number four in the chart above, the states with 16 to 30 electoral votes. The average per-Taxpayer Burden calculated by Truth in Accounting for the seven states in that category amounts to $16,000. That is an average, and an average pulled higher by Illinois. Truth in Accounting’s latest Taxpayer Burden estimate for Illinois was almost three times the average for that category.
Illinois has a lot of debt, and a long legacy of extraordinarily well-organized polltical power. Speaking of Machines, and the perspective available for pondering federal government finances, Illinois is also the “home state” of the current President of the United States, Barack Obama.