The founders’ skepticism and the problem stated
Bob Zadek opened an episode by recalling Richard Beeman’s book Plain Honest Men: The Making of the American Constitution, which reminded him how little enthusiasm the founders had for democracy. He noted that after ratification in 1788 the only direct voter participation was election of members of the House of Representatives; Senators were elected by state houses, judges were not elected, and voters elected electors who elected the President. Zadek described the founders as, at best, lukewarm about entrusting political decision-making to the everyday voter, and said that today there is more direct voter participation than the founders designed alongside an incredible amount of political ignorance and apathy Is America Doomed by Voter Ignorance? (2013).
Ilya Somin, a Professor of Law at George Mason University School of Law and author of Democracy and Political Ignorance, subtitled Why Smaller Government is Smarter, agreed that most founders were very worried about voter ignorance. He said they wanted some political participation as a check on the power of elites and the wealthy, but also worried greatly about ignorance, which was one reason they significantly limited popular participation. Somin added that many founders were concerned about ignorance-driven excesses in state governments in the 1770s and 1780s, and that James Madison, Gouverneur Morris and others believed the public was often ignorant about politics and irrational in evaluating the information it did know. Zadek added James Wilson as unenthusiastic about widespread democracy, and framed democracy as a check and a control device rather than an end in itself. Somin replied that some founders, Jefferson for instance, probably did value popular participation as an end in itself, without that preventing them from being suspicious of it Is America Doomed by Voter Ignorance? (2013).
Why it matters and what the polls show
Somin said he had been interested in the issue for at least 15 years, since he was a student, and that what persuaded him of its importance is that it affects almost all other problems in government policy. He listed the spending crisis, gay rights, racial discrimination, economic regulation and environmental policy, saying survey data usually show substantial ignorance, which feeds back into government policy and often has negative effects. He said it might go too far to call it more important than any other problem, but it is at least the problem that significantly affects all the others Is America Doomed by Voter Ignorance? (2013).
On the federal budget, Somin said most of the public greatly overestimates the amount spent on foreign aid, thinking it is at least 5 to 10 percent or more of the federal budget when in reality it is less than 1 percent, while greatly underestimating spending on big entitlement programs like Medicare and Social Security. On Obamacare, he cited a poll conducted in April by the Kaiser Foundation finding that 42 percent of the public did not realize Obamacare was still the law, and a poll a month or two later finding that 79 percent said they had heard nothing or very little about the Obamacare exchanges, which he described as a central element of the law and the way a very large portion of the population would purchase health insurance once it was fully implemented Is America Doomed by Voter Ignorance? (2013).
Somin also described ignorance about how government works. A 2006 poll found that only 42 percent of the public could name the three branches of the federal government: executive, legislative and judicial. He said the public often has trouble distinguishing events for which politicians can be given credit or blame from those for which they cannot, rewarding and punishing incumbents for short-term economic changes they very likely had nothing to do with causing, and ignoring things incumbents had more influence over. He cited local and state elections where incumbent politicians get a boost when local sports teams win championships, and governors in farm states being more likely to be blamed when a drought reduces farm prices Is America Doomed by Voter Ignorance? (2013).
Rational ignorance and political fans
Somin explained that there is very little incentive for the average voter to spend more than the minimal amount of time and effort learning about politics and government, because the chance that any one vote will make a difference is infinitesimally small—maybe about one in 60 million, very roughly speaking, in a presidential election, and somewhat higher in other elections but still very low. If a person is not inherently highly interested in politics, the only reason to acquire knowledge is to be a better voter, which he said turns out not to be much of an incentive at all. Zadek responded that he reads political blogs while brushing his teeth, interrupts his workday to check political news, and talks politics at the checkout counter, and that Somin’s point about rational self-interest makes him, in this regard, far less rational than those who pay no attention Is America Doomed by Voter Ignorance? (2013).
Somin said becoming a better voter is not the only reason people acquire political knowledge, comparing it to sports fans who learn about professional teams not because they think they can influence games but because being a fan is fun. He called people who enjoy following politics and cheering on their favorite party or candidate “political fans,” said they are only a minority of the population, and said it is not irrational to learn about politics if one enjoys it. He added that political fans often do a poor job of evaluating the information they know: if the goal is enjoying being a fan and cheering on one’s side, one tends to overvalue information confirming preexisting views and ignore or undervalue anything that cuts against them. He said studies find that ironically the people who know the most about politics are some of the most biased in evaluating the information they know, which is rational for the individual but produces bad results for politics overall Is America Doomed by Voter Ignorance? (2013).
On voting itself, Somin distinguished voting from becoming informed: voting is an extremely low-cost activity, usually maybe half an hour of one’s time at most, so if you care about your fellow citizens and think there is a substantial difference between the two sides in how good their policies are, it makes rational sense to vote. It does not make rational sense to acquire more than the minimal amount of political knowledge because that is much more costly in time and effort. The equilibrium, he said, is what is seen in the real world: large numbers of people voting, but most of them not knowing very much about what they are voting on Is America Doomed by Voter Ignorance? (2013).
The failure of the miracle of aggregation
Zadek asked about the concept that uninformed voters will zero each other out—uninformed Democrats offset by uninformed Republicans—so that informed people carry the day. Somin said some important scholars argue this, but that it is only likely to work if errors in one direction almost exactly offset errors in the other, and that the data on most issues suggest this is not true: on most issues, if you increase people’s knowledge, the distribution of opinion significantly changes. He added that it is not simply a matter of whether people vote Republican or Democratic, because the choices the parties put in front of voters are heavily influenced by their knowledge that they face a mostly ignorant electorate. If the electorate were much more knowledgeable, there might be different candidates and almost certainly different party platforms, because political professionals know the polling data and know that running to get the support of a largely ignorant electorate requires a different strategy and platform than facing more informed people Is America Doomed by Voter Ignorance? (2013).
Across episodes
The excerpts show only one episode treating voter ignorance, the 2013-09-21 conversation with Ilya Somin; the excerpts show no development across episodes.
What the sources do not cover
The excerpts do not cover the later portions of the episode announced in the introduction, including the free speech incident at Modesto Junior College and the eminent domain plan in Richmond, California, nor the caller from Sonoma. They do not state what, if anything, Somin proposes beyond the themes named in the introduction, such as decentralizing power to encourage foot voting over ballot box voting. They also do not give the outcome of any election, the content of any bill, or the holding of any case.