Ballot exhaustion

In ranked-choice voting, by method of single transferable or instant-runoff voting, ballot exhaustion occurs when a voter's ballot can no longer be counted, because all candidates on that ballot have been eliminated from an election.

Contributors to ballot exhaustion include:

1. Voter exhaustion (i.e. time or effort constraints), ^{[1] [2]}
2. Protest votes intended to oppose all unranked candidates, ^{[3] [4]}
3. Strategic truncation,
4. Jurisdictions that impose limits on how many preferences voters can express, ^{[4] [5]}
5. The elimination of popular candidates who have many 2nd, 3rd, etc. preferences in the early stages of a vote.

This may occur because the voter chooses not to fill out a complete preference ranking, ^[6] or because the ballot format itself limits the number of preferences that may be expressed. ^{[7] [8]} This results in "exhausted" or "inactive" ballots. ^[9] For example, in Minneapolis, the city limits voters to 3 rankings of candidates on ballots for city elections. ^[10]

References

1. Burnett, Craig M.; Kogan, Vladimir (2015-03-01). "Ballot (and voter) "exhaustion" under Instant Runoff Voting: An examination of four ranked-choice elections" . Electoral Studies. 37: 41–49. doi:10.1016/j.electstud.2014.11.006. If at any point the voter did not rank a next choice … or all of the choices on the voter's ballot have been eliminated, the ballot is "exhausted" meaning that it is excluded from future vote redistributions, and it does not affect the final outcome of the election.
2. "RCV Elections and Runoffs: Exhausted Votes vs Exhausted Voters in the Bay Area". FairVote. 2016-10-19. Retrieved 2024-08-28.
3. "Ballot exhaustion". Ballotpedia. Retrieved 2024-08-28.
4. Kilgour, D. Marc; Grégoire, Jean-Charles; Foley, Angèle M. (2020-07-01). "The prevalence and consequences of ballot truncation in ranked-choice elections" . Public Choice. 184 (1–2): 197–218. doi:10.1007/s11127-019-00723-2. ISSN   0048-5829. Sometimes truncation is forced—voters are allowed to rank only a limited number of candidates—but sometimes it is voluntary.
5. Minneapolis, City of. "Ranked choice voting (RCV)". vote.minneapolismn.gov. Retrieved 2024-04-14. Minneapolis uses RCV in municipal elections. With this type of voting, you can rank up to three candidates for each office.
6. Burnett, Craig M.; Kogan, Vladimir (2015-03-01). "Ballot (and voter) "exhaustion" under Instant Runoff Voting: An examination of four ranked-choice elections" . Electoral Studies. 37: 41–49. doi:10.1016/j.electstud.2014.11.006. If at any point the voter did not rank a next choice … or all of the choices on the voter's ballot have been eliminated, the ballot is "exhausted" meaning that it is excluded from future vote redistributions, and it does not affect the final outcome of the election.
7. Kilgour, D. Marc; Grégoire, Jean-Charles; Foley, Angèle M. (2020-07-01). "The prevalence and consequences of ballot truncation in ranked-choice elections" . Public Choice. 184 (1–2): 197–218. doi:10.1007/s11127-019-00723-2. ISSN   0048-5829. Sometimes truncation is forced—voters are allowed to rank only a limited number of candidates—but sometimes it is voluntary.
8. "RCV Elections and Runoffs: Exhausted Votes vs Exhausted Voters in the Bay Area". FairVote. 2016-10-19. Retrieved 2024-08-28.
9. "Ballot exhaustion". Ballotpedia. Retrieved 2024-08-28.
10. Minneapolis, City of. "Ranked choice voting (RCV)". vote.minneapolismn.gov. Retrieved 2024-04-14. Minneapolis uses RCV in municipal elections. With this type of voting, you can rank up to three candidates for each office.