Voting by Mail vs. Expressive Utility

Last weekend, I spent a couple hours canvassing in Virginia's 5th congressional district. Although I knew the size of the district (fun fact - it’s larger than New Jersey, as well as five other states), I didn’t fully appreciate how spread out the different precincts are until I went canvassing. Just going from door to door took a few minutes by car, and many houses were 20 or more minutes by car from polling places. I consider Charlottesville and other nearby towns to be urban or suburban, but towns just a few miles south of Charlottesville felt very rural. This means that many 5th district residents have a relatively high marginal cost of voting, which could affect their decision to vote or not vote.

This issue also hits close to home in another way. I’m from California, the first state to institute no-excuse absentee voting and a state in which many voters vote by mail. Virginia, by contrast, requires an approved excuse to vote absentee. I have always assumed that giving voters this option increases voter turnout - anecdotally, I know many people who vote by mail in primary elections (which typically have low turnout) who would otherwise not vote at all due to the difficulty of voting in person on a work day. Whether you live in rural Virginia or San Francisco, voting in person takes more time and effort than voting by mail. However, as we discussed in class today, this change in marginal cost doesn’t always make a difference to voters. If marginal benefit is infinitesimal and marginal cost is insignificant, this implies that D, which can represent social benefit, utility in the act of voting, civic duty, and expressive utility, is more significant in Johnson’s equation. Reducing marginal cost through voting by mail may only increase turnout "modestly in midterm and presidential elections but may increase turnout more in primaries, local elections, and special elections,” according to MIT’s Election Data + Science Lab. While this modest increase in voter turnout shouldn't be discounted, coupling voting by mail with initiatives to maintain expressive value when voting early (like still getting a sticker!) would be most effective in increasing turnout.