Concerns Over Mail-In Voting and Election Fraud

What’s all the fuss about mail-in voting? President Trump has repeatedly warned that mail-in voting is too inefficient and ridden with fraud to be trusted. But there is little evidence to back up that charge. Absentee ballots came into use during the Civil War to allow soldiers to vote from the battlefield.  Since then all 50 states have offered absentee ballots. President Trump himself has used absentee ballots to vote several times. The main distinction between universal mail-in voting and absentee voting is that people have to apply for absentee ballots, whereas ballots are simply mailed to all registered voters with mail-in voting. President Trump worries that universal mailing ends up sending ballots to dead people, voters that have moved, and other mismailings. On that point he is correct. Since election boards use mailing lists from the prior election, it is inevitable that millions of ballots will be sent to dead people and movers. Those same dead people and movers get lots of mail (including recent stimulus checks) until someone notifies the election board of the change. 

Outdated mailing lists are not the problem, however. The real issue is fraud. Do political zealots go around collecting ballots of dead people and movers, then cast them for their own favored candidate? Trump suggests that is the case, but there is no evidence to support that fear. Five states have used mail-in voting for the last 20 years. Studies have shown that the incidence of fraud is so low that it is insignificant. Further, mail-votes are remarkably similar to in-person votes, implying that they don’t change election outcomes. 

Why is this an economic issue? The theory of public choice emphasizes how decision mechanisms affect economic policy decisions. In this election, election outcomes will have a profound impact on a host of policy decisions, including taxes, trade, transfer payments, and environmental protection. 

Questions/Discussion:

1. Why is mail-in voting an important economic issue in 2020?
2. What steps could be taken to improve the integrity of mail-in voting?

Sources: Washington Post- Yes, tons of ballots are sent to dead people. Trump shouldn’t worry about them. Photo by Tiffany Tertipes on Unsplash