I see this come up a lot in discussions about voting in America. Postal votes disproportionately go to Democrats, hence the Democrats want to expand postal voting while Republicans want to restrict it (and insist there is totally a bunch of fraud going on).

I’ve googled with a few search engines and haven’t found a convincing reason. Lots of evidence that the skew is real, but no explanation as to why. Indeed, if one just looks at demographics, one would expect postal voting to benefit Republicans by facilitating votes from people in the countryside who live far away from voting centers.

So what actually gives?

  • StupidBrotherInLaw@lemmy.world
    4·
    3 hours ago

    This explanation doesn’t make sense mathematically, though. If the ratio of Democrat to Republican voters is fairly consistent amongst groups, increasing the number of people in any given group that votes will result in that same ratio, just with greater numbers. Saying otherwise is like saying you can add 2% milk to 2% milk to eventually get back to whole milk

    The only way voting by mail helps Democrats is if the vote by mail crowd has a heavier democratic skew.

    • ChokingHazard@lemmy.world
      2·
      3 hours ago

      If fewer people vote, it often favors the republicans. When more people vote it goes the other way. If it’s 60:40 and 100 people vote that’s 20 people. If it’s a thousand it’s 200 more people. I have a strong suspicion that the Republican party has been cheating for a long time which is why they claim the democrats have to be when they win. They always tell on themselves.

      • StupidBrotherInLaw@lemmy.world
        1·
        2 hours ago

        Let me show you an example. Let’s use easy ratios for easy numbers, so let’s say people vote Democrat to Republican 3:2.

        If you have 100 people vote, you’ll end up with 60 democratic votes, 40 Republican.

        If you have 200 people vote, you’ll have 120 Democrat votes, 80 Republican.

        Increasing the number of total voters in this scenario will never change the outcome. 400 people? 240 to 160.

        The only way getting more votes by mail will help Democrats win an election is if the ratio of Democrat to Republican voters is higher in mail-in voters compared to other population groups.

        Or are you suggesting Democrats are less reliable voters, so getting them to vote increases the relative percentage of Democrat voters?