  One commonly claimed obligation of political participation is an obligation to vote. Support for this is sometimes attempted by appealing to a loose generalization argument that asks, “What if everybody failed to vote?” or, in the language here, “What if everybody chose to free ride on the voting of others?” The practical answer to that question, of course, is that everybody does not choose to free ride, only some do, and that it is exceedingly unlikely that everyone will choose to do so. But if I think almost no one else will vote, I should probably conclude that it is therefore then in my interest to vote (that day has yet to come). Perhaps there is some number of citizens, k, such that, if fewer than k citizens vote, democracy will fail. If so, half of all citizens seems likely to be a number significantly greater than k. Local elections in the US often turn out far less than half the eligible citizens and presidential elections turn out a bit more than half. One may question just what kind of democracy the US has, but it seems in some significant ways to work.