Increase Voter Turnout

Some of my personal suggestions to increase voter turnout is to better educate individuals on how to register to vote. There needs to be information giving out on news stations, television ads, newspaper ads, and billboards about where the locations are for people to register to vote. There also needs to be more attention devoted to advanced balloting since some individuals are not able to make it to the polling stations on the day of elections. I would suggest that there be more locations for individuals to pick up voter registration and advanced ballot forms and someone there to explain what the individuals need to do if they do not understand.

I would suggest having voter registration and advanced balloting booths set up in places that individuals frequently visit, such as grocery or department stores. A possible method for slightly increasing younger aged individuals voter registration would be to have forms available at high schools and college campuses, and have a great deal of emphasis placed on where these locations are so individuals can go vote.

At times, individuals are registered to vote, but they do not go to the polling station because they are unsure of where they are supposed to vote. So there needs to be more community organization in which individuals are told where they go vote and directions if they are unsure of the location.

Another way to increase voter turnout would be to provide more options for individuals to vote on, with issues and candidates. The clean money system would be a good method of getting some of the money out of politics and placing more power back in the hands of the average individual. This would allow average people to be able to run for office and have political powers to get their viewpoints out to the public.

I have some ideas of possible ways of increasing voter turnout that will not be beneficial to the nation. I’ve heard of thoughts of paying individuals to vote, like a plasma center pays individuals to give plasma. This may increase voter turnout, but it would be selling out democracy in the same kind of sense as corporations buying elections, but with different outcomes. I’ve also heard of proposed mandatory voting, which is done in Australia, to force individuals to go to the polling station or they will be convicted of a crime. This doesn’t seem like it would work, people that don’t want to vote wouldn’t vote anyways because the penalty for not voting couldn’t be too severe. If this was made into a law, where would the money come from for law enforcement to track down all of the individuals who do not vote. And with time restrictions on when individuals would have to register by, it would make it difficult for people who frequently move to register and vote.