An impossibility theorem for gerrymandering
I think this indirectly hints at something much more fundamental: district based plurality does not make sense as an election system anymore.<p>I think an eye opening example is to consider a hypothetical single state with 10 representatives. This state has a population, perfectly well distributed, of 35% democrat, 30% republican, 20% libertarian, and 15% green. And we draw our districts up with absolutely no bias whatsoever. What &#x27;should&#x27; the election results be? I think any logical person would say about 3.5 democrats, 3 republicans, 2 libertarians, and about 1.5 greens. What we get in reality? 10 democrats as they win a plurality in each and every district. 0 gerrymandering, 35% of the support, 100% of the seats.<p>To get our above example to have the logical results we want, you end up having to create really absurd districts that would completely dwarf any sort of gerrymandering of today. So then the question is quite obvious. Why don&#x27;t we do at large proportional elections instead of district based plurality elections? If a state has 10 representatives then any party is guaranteed at least 1 seat if they get 10% support, 2 for 20%, and so on.<p>In the past when politicians and the people were much closer, I think districts made a lot more sense. You were voting for somebody who you knew or were at worst split by the most minimal degrees of separation. But today this isn&#x27;t true. The average congressional district is now up to 710,767 people [1] (as of 2010). In 1790, at the time of the first US census, the average district size was 37,082. Times have changed, but our electoral system has not.<p>[1] - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;List_of_United_States_congressional_districts" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;List_of_United_States_congress...</a>