Alan Greenblatt is a GOVERNING correspondent.
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An Argument for IRV
You may not have paid much attention to Tuesday's runoff election for labor commissioner in North Carolina. Not many people did -- even in North Carolina, where turnout for the only election on the runoff ballot was just 1.9 percent.
Nonetheless, gearing up all the voting machinery and opening up the precincts cost a total of $4 million. That, according to Democracy North Carolina, adds up to $50 per vote cast -- more in some counties. The group suggests that this election makes a particularly strong argument in favor of instant runoff voting, in which people name their first and second choices on the original election day.
Maybe so. Or maybe it's an argument for public financing of campaigns -- $50 per vote would be enough to win most contests. But I guess Obama's ruined that now for everybody.
GOVERNING Politics is the place for news and analysis on campaigns and elections. If there's a ballot measure in California, a legislative election in Alabama, a mayoral election in Anchorage or a governor's race in Rhode Island, GOVERNING Politics probably is writing about it. We love everything about state and local politics, from polls and campaign ads to policy debates and demographic trends.
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