Editorial: Election 2020 - Who wins when the majority vote early?

Popping in early has never been so popular. File photo / Chris Gorman

Editorial

EDITORIAL:

Now we know New Zealand voters are keen as beans to cast their votes - but who gets an advantage from early ballots?

More than 165,000 eager voters turned out on the first weekend of early voting. Data from the Electoral Commission shows 165,180 votes were cast over the first two days.

Advance voting accounted for 47 per cent of all votes in 2017, and the Electoral Commission says it could go as high as 60 per cent this time.

Perhaps the rush is because of the deferred polling day, due to the disruptions of Covid-19, and potential further lockdowns.

But it also reflects already evident overseas trends.

In the early 1990s, only about 7 per cent of American voters took the early option. In 2016, according to the US Election Assistance Commission, 17.2 per cent of all ballots were cast through in-person early voting, and a further 23.7 per cent through mail-in absentee ballots.

Around the world, increasing the voting period has been done to increase voter turnout. Interestingly, it appears to have had the opposite effect.

A 2013 University of Wisconsin study found "early voting lowers the likelihood of turnout by three to four percentage points".

One theory for this is it diffuses parties' get-out-and-vote efforts just before and on election day. Spread out over several weeks, these efforts do not have the same intensity and may not work so well.

One clear downside is the potential for events or disclosures to occur late in the campaign, which might change a voters' mind, after the ballot slip has been filed into the box.

In Europe, it has been theorised early voting favours the left and perhaps this is why President Barack Obama is thought to have been the first US candidate to do so, in 2012, thus endorsing the practice.

However, a recent working paper by the Institute for Economic Policy Research at Stanford University concluded both parties benefited more or less equally from the rise in early voting.

As is the case in so much of this day and age, the winner is convenience. Whichever date suits you, make sure you take the opportunity to have your say.