The Simple Math of Voter Turnout

Ruy Teixeira: “Start with this: when Democrats persuade a voter to change sides, that nets two votes for the Democrats (one considerably less for the Republicans, just one additional for the Democrats). When Democrats turn out just one more voter to vote Democratic that is, of study course, a web of only 1 vote for them.”

“But it is truly even worse than that. Ordinarily, Democrats consider of elevated base turnout in conditions of turning out extra voters from several pro-Democratic demographic groups—young voters, black voters, Hispanic voters, college-educated whites, no matter what. But not all the voters in these teams favor the Democrats so mobilization of much more voters from a offered group may perhaps very well web significantly less than a person vote for each extra voter. For case in point, wanting at present Congressional ballot choices, Democrats might web only a third of a vote for each additional Hispanic or youthful voter, 6-tenths of a vote from each and every supplemental black voter and just a sixth of a vote from every single supplemental school-educated white voter.”

“The math appears to be like even a lot more unfavorable when the following is thought of: Democrats are inclined to suppose that nonvoters from a supplied demographic are the same politically as voters from the similar group… other than they really do not vote. But a mountain of political science evidence exhibits that is not so.”

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