Storable Votes - Part II

可存储选票是一种简单的投票机制，它赋予选民一定数量的奖励选票，并允许他们在一段时间内提出的一系列二元决策中选择投多少票。每项决定都是根据投票的多数作出的。这种机制促使选民表达他们的偏好强度，尽管通常不是最优的，但它有三个主要优点。首先，相对于简单多数投票，可储存选票通常会增加预期福利。其次，可储存的选票使得有系统的少数人偶尔获胜成为可能，而总效率的损失很小或没有损失。最后，在实验室实验中发现了良好的机理。本提案讨论了三个关于可存储选票的新研究项目。首先，可储存选票对可能的议程操纵的敏感性尚不清楚。当其他成员的红利票都用完的时候，一个选民是否可以通过提出削减福利的建议来“强迫”委员会的其他成员做出削减福利的决定？答案并不明确，因为议程形成过程成为游戏的一部分，改变了所有策略。其次，可存储的选票与其他旨在引发偏好强度的投票机制（如交替独裁、贿选或渐近有效的Jackson和Sonnenschein机制）相比如何？提出了对这些问题的理论和实验研究。（该提案的这些部分是与托马斯·帕尔弗雷（Thomas Palfrey）共同提出的）。第三，在大量人口中，一个特别简单、静态的可存储选票的实现是，在对一系列同时进行的公投进行投票时，给予选民额外的一票。过去已经得出了理论结果。在这里，我们建议通过一个基于互联网的实验来评估它们。（本文由安德鲁·格尔曼和邓肯·沃茨联合撰写）。最后，该提案讨论了一个无关但引人入胜的贿选历史例子：1519年查理五世当选神圣罗马帝国皇帝。查理与其对手法国国王弗朗索瓦一世（Francois I）向七名选帝侯提出的具体合同，除了有大量可获得的数据外，这一事件还因协议的复杂程度而引人注目：选帝侯按照成文的顺序投票，有条件的合同是书面的，其中义务取决于其他选帝侯的行为。该集具有可存储投票模型的一些特征，特别是顺序拍卖结构。（提案的这一部分是与弗朗索瓦·维尔德共同完成的）。更广泛的影响。目前，政策圈对投票规则的兴趣非常强烈，实际上比学术界更强烈。一些显而易见的事件点燃了这种激情：2000年美国总统大选，2005年春季欧盟宪法公投否决，联合国安理会改革讨论暂停。一本关于可存储选票的书正在与牛津大学出版社签订合同，其中的大部分内容应该是大众感兴趣的，但更公开的讨论需要对本提案中提出的问题给出一些答案。由于这些项目结合了非常不同的方法（经济理论、实验工作、数值练习、在线实验和历史研究），它们也是理想的教学工具，能够雇用具有不同才能和处于职业生涯不同阶段的学生。

Storable votes is a simple voting mechanism that endows voters with a stock of bonus votes and allows them to choose how many votes to cast over a series of binary decisions proposed over time. Each decision is taken according to the majority of votes cast. The mechanism induces voters to express the intensity of their preferences, and although not generally optimal has three main virtues. First, storable votes typically increase expected welfare relative to simple majority voting. Second, storable votes make it possible for a systematic minority to win occasionally, at small or no loss in aggregate efficiency. Finally, the mechanism has been found to perform well in laboratory experiments. This proposal discusses three new research projects on storable votes. First, the sensitivity of storable votes to possible manipulation of the agenda is not known. Could a voter "force" a welfare-reducing decision on the rest of the committee by proposing it when the others have exhausted their bonus votes? The answer is not clear because the agenda formation procedure becomes part of the game, altering all strategies. Second, how do storable votes compare to other voting mechanisms designed to elicit intensity of preferences - mechanisms like alternating dictatorship, or vote-buying, or the asymptotically efficient Jackson and Sonnenschein mechanism? Both theoretical and experimental research on these questions is proposed. (These parts of the proposal are joint with Thomas Palfrey). Third, a particularly simple, static, implementation of storable votes in large populations is to grant voters one extra, vote when voting over a bundle of simultaneous referenda. Theoretical results have been derived in the past. Here we propose to evaluate them through an internet-based experiment. (This part is joint with Andrew Gelman and Duncan Watts). Finally, the proposal discusses an unrelated but fascinating historical example of votebuying: the 1519 election of Charles V to emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. In addition to the extraordinary availability of data on the exact contracts that Charles and its opponent, Francois I, the king of France, proposed to the seven electors, the episode is remarkable for the sophistication of the agreements: the electors voted sequentially according to a codified order and conditional contracts were written where obligations depended on the behavior of the other electors. The episode shares some features of the storable votes model, in particular the sequential auction structure. (This part of the proposal is joint with Francois Velde). Broader Impact. The interest in voting rules is at the moment very strong in policy circles, in fact stronger than in academia. It has been kindled by a number of very visible events: the 2000 US presidential election, the negative referenda on the Constitution in the European Union in the Spring of 2005, the halting discussion of reform of the Security Council of the United Nations. A book on storable votes is under contract with Oxford University Press, and large parts of it should be of general interest, but a more public discussion requires some answers to the issues raised in this proposal. Because the projects combine very different methodologies (economic theory, experimental work, numerical exercises, online experiments, and historical research) they are also ideal teaching tools, able to employ students with different talents and at different stages of the their career.