Let’s face it as far as voter turnout goes, the United States has seen
better days and Texas being so large of a state could make a huge
difference in that number.
If Texas wants a larger voter turnout to the polls and wants to have a
louder voice in the big elections then they need to start solving the problem
small and work their way up. There are two problems with the current voter
turnout that would concern anyone even knowing the slightest bit about politics
and those two problems are: Uneducated Voters and Low Voting Turnout. Both of
these problems could easily be fixed if they were approached at a un- over thought
process. People love to compete, people love to have fun and people love free stuff.
If the people of Texas were more educated on voting then there would
not be so many, “Well why vote, if my vote doesn’t even count?” comments. Even
those Texans that do vote want to know half the time what happened that what they
voted for isn’t being implemented, without even knowing that they may have
misunderstood the wording of what they voted for on the ballot. If those voting
were more educated on their rights, policies and actual voting all together
then they would be more apt to vote and not be voting for the things that they
really do not want. The only way to fix this problem is going to be to provide
citizens with a fast easy lesson and an incentive to get out and take the
class.
It would be plausible to say that many would become concerned about the
amount of money that this type of education would cost the government and in
turn the tax payers; however, what if the burden did not fall on the government
at all? What if the burden mostly fell on business that could reap what they
sow in a way? The structure would go as
follows theoretically speaking; if businesses were broken down into 3 size
categories (therefore competing among their equals) and received a large enough
tax break to catch their eye based on the highest voter turnout that took their
class then the cost of the classes would therefore be covered. The businesses would
receive their award, based on size, from either the Texas Leverage Fund or the
Texas Product/Business Fund and therefore cost the government and tax payers no
extra funding. Who would run these events with no extra costs for hourly wages?
A current student that is legal resident of the state of Texas, with no current
criminal charges would receive 3 hours of oral communication credit for either
high school or college depending on their level of study. It has been
statistically proven that more than 50% of people’s number one fear is public
speaking but everyone has to do it. Overall the whole process is beneficial to
everyone involved and in turn the benefits would be more educated voters and no
extra charges to the tax payers.
In the event that the voters become more educated the state would want
to see a higher voter turnout and could do so by making the whole process
easier and more welcoming to those that are eligible voters. Although it may
not be the most upright and politically responsible image that everyone would
be hoping for, if to promote voting you brought it down to a level that the
citizens understand and enjoy the turnout would increase. Festivals, carnivals,
concerts, celebrities, ACL, Eeyore’s Birthday, and Marley Fest these are the
venues that Texans show up to in large numbers teach them what you want them to
know and have an event that they are drawn to and then voter education and
turnout are not such a concern.
This is a response to an article titled "What's The Problem With Voting?" on a blog called Politically Texas. This article talks about the recent statistics regarding the relatively low voting turnouts in Texas. The author says that voting turnout should not be ignored and that something should be done about it. One particular detail pointed out is that most of the Texas voting eligibility turnout is particularly filled with many "uneducated voters." The author continues to solve this problem by suggesting a quick and easy political class that could be taken so that many of those who are uneducated can then be educated by what they are actually voting for. She also points out that it would not just be a class to be taken for fun, but could also be as a sort of college credit course that could give you certain numbers of hours and become educated at the same time, knocking out two birds with one stone.
ReplyDeleteI particularly like this idea but would argue that turnout for coming to even a FREE class about voting is highly unlikely when going out to cast a single vote is already low in the beginning. You could make it as interesting as possible but unless this turns into a required coarse to enroll in before you turn 18 as in high school, I won't be positively sure that this would create as great a turnout as other simplistic ideas as making voter registration easier.
All in all I think this was a very well informative post with many great ideas that could greatly increase voter turnout in Texas which we are in dire need of increasing. I hope there are many more people who agrees as I do and will finally create an easier system for voting and overall increase the voter distribution in Texas.