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But the value of your vote isn't actually 1 in # of votes. It's actually P(your state undecided) x P(nation undecided without your state) x (Value of your candidate winning - Value of other candidate winning).

For example, say your state has 10 million voters and the election is a statistical dead heat (i.e., each voter has a probability of p=0.5 for voting for candidate A vs B). Then P(your state undecided without your vote) = (5 million choose 10 million) x pow(2^-10 million) ~= 1/(sqrt(2 pi) 2.5 million) = 1.6e-7.

And that's assuming the best case where your state's voters could go either way. The probabilities become exponentially smaller (literally: exp(-n^2)) if your state actually has political leanings.

I'm also not sure how we could even approach a $6 trillion gap under plausible assumptions. Does anyone really believe that the gap between each candidate is $6 trillion (note: total economy is $15B) or $20k/person?




If you take compound interest and the legacy for generations to come into consideration, the difference from decisions made today between the candidates would easily surpass $6 trillion, and possibly while you're still alive. Besides, things like education, over time, have far more intangible and invaluable implications than a figure could ever show.


If you take compound interest and the legacy for generations to come into consideration...

And also don't use a discount rate...

Besides, things like education, over time, have far more intangible and invaluable implications than a figure could ever show.

Could you explain this claim?


The Iraq war, at $4 trillion? These things add up.

Also, over 4 years, the U.S. GDP is $60 trillion, $6 trillion is 10% of that.

How much better do you think that your preferred candidate will do? 5% better? 1% better?


$2.4T in nominal dollars, considerably less with time discounting.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2007/10/24/us-iraq-usa-fundin...

This also assumes that $OTHER_CANDIDATE would not have done something similar, which I don't think is correct. The war in Afghanistan was a virtual certainty, regardless of who was president.




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