A Note on Banzhaf Power in the Electoral College in the 2008 U.S. Presidential Election
نویسندگان
چکیده
One way to measure the a priori voting power of the states in the U.S. Electoral College is to view it as a weighted voting system and calculate power indices of the states. However this does not take into account the fact that in a given presidential election some states are almost certain to vote for a particular candidates, nor does it allow for states to split their electoral votes between more than one candidate. We propose a method for measuring voting power in the Electoral College for the 2008 U.S. presidential election, by giving candidates the votes of their “safe” states and finding the Banzhaf power indices of the remaining states. The vote-splitting that occurred is accounted for. Our results show that the smaller states have a higher proportion of power relative to their proportion of the electoral votes than the larger states, unlike the results for a generic election.
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