Have you ever wondered why the voting rights are available to us Indians only after we turn eighteen? Why not a truly 'Universal Franchise'? They say this age limit is put forth because those below that age are not 'mature' enough to decide what's good for them. Isn't that pure hogwash? The guys much below that age are taking the boards, the IITJEE, the AIEEE, the CPMT, the AIPMT and what not EE's and PMT's. So these guys are deemed fit to take some of the most stressful and rigourous exams in the world ( stressful for boards, just check the suicide rates ), but they do not have brains enough to decide which idiot is a better idiot to govern us? No, you say. Very well, that was not my point, but now I will start on it. You agree that some people are not just fit to govern themselves, or, to put it mildly, they do not know what is good for them. Can't vote before 18, can't marry before 21 and can't drink before 25. Two things must be noted - in a country claiming to be a democracy, there are restrictions on what one can't do if one does not qualify according to some criterion; secondly, that this criterion is always the age. Behind these age limits is the thinking that the person is not knowledgeable enough or world-wise enough before some given age – it’s all got to with the brains. And brain keeps on developing till about 18 years of age - that means anybody below eighteen has scope to grow brainwise - some grow fast, some slow, and that is why we have the concept of Intelligence Quotient - I.Q. = mental age / chronological age in percentage. That means that if a kid 10 years old shows a mental age of 12, i.e if a fifth grader can solve seventh grade problems, he has an IQ of 12/10 X 100 =120. But this model applies only for upto eighteen years of age. Does than mean after 18 years, all human beings have the same intelligence. No, the intelligence follows a bell shaped curve, with a mean (average) of 100 (i.e. on an average, an adult shows an intelligence of an adult). Here is appended a graph of IQ of the human population. As you can see, quite a few people are above 100, and quite a few are below it. And this is the data for the adult population, which means that some of the adults, who have the right to vote and might be using it at the next elections, are simply not in the knowledge of 'what is good for them' (according to the criterion on which below 18 are barred from voting), and with their unqualified voting, they might be wreaking havoc on the system. Similarly, nearly the same are above 100, that means many are too well equipped with their faculties, and the single vote accorded to them is simply not doing justice to the collective human intelligence stock - its like selling Darjeeling tea and ordinary tea at the same rate! One might say that there is no great harm in this system, after all, the damage done by the below par would be covered up by the judicious voting of the above pars - that is the beauty of the bell curve - in the end, everything is balanced. But is the damage rectified in the end, in the real system. We have not yet looked into one important piece of theory that is essential to this whole idea - The Market for Lemons. This theory is being brought to you lifted straight from the Wikipedia page, because I feel they have explained it way better than I could:
“The interaction between quality heterogeneity and asymmetrical information can lead to the disappearance of a market where guarantees are indefinite. In this model, as quality is undistinguishable beforehand by the buyer (due to the asymmetry of information), incentives exist for the seller to pass off a low-quality good as a higher-quality one.
The buyer, however, takes this incentive into consideration, and takes the quality of the good to be uncertain. Only the average quality of the good will be considered, which in turn will have the side effect that goods that are above average in terms of quality will be driven out of the market. This mechanism is repeated until a no-trade equilibrium is reached.”
To see this theory in the context I am writing about, one will have to take a very loose interpretation of the Lemon Market. It is assumed that the higher educated and intelligent group of voters expect a good economy, national prestige, equality of opportunity, honesty at work and all such stuff one can find in a moral science book (Why is it called ‘science’ anyway??), and those on the wrong side of intelligence curve, with lower education would want to see a leader who vouched for their caste, their religion, their region, their language etc. This type of group may also like a leader who subsidises products, bankrolls useless projects for bogus employment etc. most of these issues have little or no bearing on a person’s standard of living, and are basically petty prestige issues, or may be good for it in the short run (reservations and subsidies) but are detrimental for the country in the long run. Now, consider these groups of people ‘selling’ their votes on the electoral ‘market’ in exchange for ‘good governance’ – good according to their own ideas. Now, the netas buy these votes – both high quality and low quality. Assuming the even distribution of the bright and dull minds across the country, a neta does not know if a particular voter is high class or low class. Low class votes come cheap – incite a communal riot or just bash up ‘outsiders’ in your state – voila! Votes! High class votes require real efforts, real management skills: efforts that are reflected in the country’s , state’s or constituency’s economic and social health. When running companies requires a person to clear the really tough management entrance exams (to prove intelligence, diligence and aptitude), just imagine the aptitude, intelligence and diligence required to run the whole states and countries. And though the cost price of both types of votes for the buyer (netas) is different, their satisfaction utility for them is the same i.e. one vote. Remember that Deepika jee advertisement for Nirma Super – “ Jab wohi mehge damon waali quality, wohi safedi, wohi jhaag, kam damon mein miley, to koi yeh kyun le, woh na le?” ( If you get the quality, whiteness and froth as given by the costly detergent with the cheap one too, why not go for the cheap one?”) So, the netas pay only for the low class votes – they come cheap, and in numbers.
Now, the higher end voters do not find any takers for their votes, i.e. no market – so they leave the market, thus lowering the average level of the ‘seller of votes’ still further. Again the politicians does not know about individual voters – so he would aim for the cheaper ones among the reduced vote bank – in the process driving out the cream of the reduced vote bank. Thus the level of voters keeps on falling and falling – our no trade equilibrium is reached – not that the votes are not polled now – it’s just that the trade is not present – even the promise of roast chicken and a quarter of desi daaru is enough to get the votes.
In the standard market for lemons scenario, the solution is given – inform the buyer about the products and its quality, and how to distinguish between the high quality and low quality products. Now, in a standard used car market (the scenario for which the lemon theory was proposed), a buyer has the incentive to know about high quality goods. But then, there is no incentive for netas to go looking for the high quality votes. So, an incentive needs to be introduced. This is what I call a ‘Meritocracy’, or ‘Rule of the Brainy’ or some other fancy name I will think of later. (Gotta search for fancy Greek words to go with -cracy ). Assign a weight to the vote according to the IQ of the voter, those above hundred getting more than one and those below 100 getting less. Now here comes the catch – most IQ tests are designed by the West – which may not give a true estimate of a non-English educated/ uneducated Indian intelligence. So, what is to be done – we could design non language based tests, as used in the case of uneducated. Or, verbal questions can be asked audibly in the language of the voter, who is to press buttons according his choice in the objective type test. But won’t the ‘higher class’ get organised together, and use its increased voting power to marginalize the ‘lower class’ issues, and perpetuate an IQ apartheid. Of course they can. Till now I have considered that the higher class needs to be benevolent and dedicated to the long term greater good, but if you see the chat threads on the India community on Orkut, this belief is shattered violently. So what is to be done now? Simple! Include personality type tests in the judgement criteria in deciding whether to weigh a person’s vote up or down – the questions need to be subtle – as in MMPI or Rorschar tests etc. We could put the positive personalities (whose judgement is deemed to be pro-development) for a 1+ voting rights, while the negative personalities could get 1- voting rights. To avoid the organization of ‘Super Intelligent Tyrants’, the tests could be done at the time of polling itself – after all, it is a long process – verifying ID’s, striking off the names, taking the ballot papers, voting and putting it in, getting the fingers marked. Introduce another stage – taking of test – make it quick, and do not even disclose the result of this intelligence-aptitude test – so that the person does not know the amount of voting power he has as he enters to the next station – the polling machine. Just multiply his vote by a Correction Factor CF, and put it in to the account of the candidate the person has voted for.
Still, a big question remains – how to calculate the CF? Well, the purpose of the CF is to make the buying of the higher end votes profitable for the netas, i.e giving them their efforts worth. Now I will be going a bit technical to answer this technical question – we have assumed that the demands of the intelligent/development oriented are more money/effort consuming as compared to the demands of low end/dimwitted/chauvinism oriented. Now efforts can be monetized, and we can say that the cost of satisfying a voter want is a function of his IQ, where IQ now means an overall coefficient, a combination of intelligence and aptitude – perhaps more of the later. i.e. Cost/vote = f (IQ). This cost can be calculated if the system is actually to be brought in – just tabulate the cost of chicken and daaru, the cost of organizing riots (Molotov cocktails, spears, swords, sabers), the cost of subsidies & the cost of pursuing long term economic policies etc. against the IQ level of the people to whom the ‘effort’ is aimed at, and plot a recursion curve to get the trendline – this is the Cost/vote(IQ) function. Now for break even, the cost = the income. That is, the pay-off to the netas should be commensurate to the cost incurred in satisfying that vote bank – i.e the CF(IQ) curve should model the Cost/vote(IQ) curve. So, it means:
CF(IQ) = [Cost/vote(IQ)/Cost/vote(100)]
Well said, but how to get this system into place – now that is a question I do not have an answer for at this stage!
