New Hampshire doesn’t allow early voting – you can’t cast a ballot before election day unless you’re going to be out of town or unable to make it to the polls – and yet we consistently have one of the highest election turnout percentages among similar states, as I learned from this story.
That seems weird. Making it more convenient to vote should increase the number of people who vote, right? But human behavior is not a logical, consistent thing – as we all know, often to our detriment.
This is a good example of evidence clashing with “common sense”. People who want to see as many people vote as possible usually support early voting but if the data says it doesn’t make a difference then they should back off. They rarely do, however – our preconceived notions are hard to dislodge.
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