Death to the Gerrymander
The thought experiment I've liked in the past is...Say you have a 55/45 state, with 9 congressional districts. Roughly speaking, what is most fair? A 5/4 district split? Or, each district being 55-45, i.e. 9/0?If I'm reading it right, it sounds like the efficiency gap would mean that 5/4 would be more fair, but that would actually require drawing districts in a way that pays attention to the political and demographic makeup of the geography.I get that for many states, if the Democrats had the 55, then current gerrymandering means that they might only get 2/7, or two out of the nine candidates, which seems wildly off no matter how you look at it, but still, I have trouble identifying the principle of what fair actually is. And I don't like the answer of just arbitrarily picking a math formula that is used the same way everywhere. Because, in the absence of a principle behind it, it could be just as distorted. For instance, if 5/4 is more fair, then a geographically blind districting program could very easily end up with similar blended districts leading to a 9/0 state.