Muppets Use IRV

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Muppets Use IRV
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Muppets Use IRV

• Starting in the early '90s, the Henson production
  company started to pay the Muppets with stock
  options rather than a straight salary. Quietly,
  the Muppets, as a group, gained a controlling
  interest in the Henson production.

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Muppets Use IRV

• In a move that shocked the world, the Muppets
  decided to elect one of their own as the CEO of
  the company. Being savvy students of the world,
  the Muppets chose instant runoff voting in order
  to elect a candidate who would best reflect their
  views. They decided to choose among five
  candidates Beaker, Elmo, Ernie, Miss Piggy and
  Oscar the Grouch.

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Muppets Use IRV

• Under instant runoff voting (IRV), the Muppet
  voters ranked the candidates a 'one' for their
  favorite candidate, a 'two' for their second
  favorite and so on - up to five choices. Votes
  were counted for the top-ranked candidate on each
  ballot. After counting these ballots, no
  candidate had a majority of the vote and thus no
  candidate had won. The candidate with the fewest
  votes was eliminated.

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Muppets Use IRV

• In the second round, ballots were counted without
  the eliminated candidate - meaning the ballots of
  that candidate's supporters counted for their
  next choice. This process of eliminating
  candidates and counting the votes took place
  until a candidate won with a majority of the
  vote.

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Muppets Use IRV

• At first it looks as though Oscar the Grouch will
  be the winner - indeed, if the Muppets had used a
  simplistic 'plurality' voting system, then Oscar
  would have won. He has more votes than any other
  candidate (in other words a plurality).

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Muppets Use IRV

• But IRV requires a candidate to possess a
  majority, which Oscar fails to secure in the
  first round of counting - he clearly has strong
  support, but his support is not strong enough to
  help him cross the 'majority line.' A strong CEO
  should have both strong support and wide support,
  and IRV helps measure which candidate best
  achieves that balance. So the candidate with
  fewest first-choice votes, Miss Piggy, is
  defeated, and the count moves onto a second round.

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Muppets Use IRV

• The ballots originally cast for Miss Piggy are
  now counted for the candidates listed as the
  second choice on each ballot. Everyone else has
  their ballot count for their first choice
  candidate. Note that one ballot does not count
  for any candidate -- rumor has it that Miss Piggy
  only voted for one candidate, 'Moi.' No
  candidate has a majority of the vote yet, and
  Beaker now loses.

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Muppets Use IRV

• In this round of voting, three candidates remain.
  Note that Ernie is showing not only strong
  support (he was second to Oscar after the first
  count), but broad support - he keeps picking up
  more votes as other candidates are eliminated.
• We can see that Elmo did not receive enough votes
  to remain in the running. He too is eliminated.

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Muppets Use IRV

• When Elmo loses, ballots that had been cast for
  him are now counted for either Oscar or Ernie.
  Note that some ballots are counting for a
  third-choice candidate - those voters who had
  listed Miss Piggy or Beaker first and Elmo
  second.
• With the field narrowed to two, Ernie secures a
  majority of the votes cast and crosses the
  'majority line.'

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Muppets Use IRV

• Before we find out who the winner is, let's take
  a closer look at the ballot of one of the (few!)
  Muppets who voted for Miss Piggy as their
  favorite candidate. This Muppet's ballot first
  counted for Miss Piggy, but after she was
  eliminated, the ballot counted for the second
  choice - Elmo. Once Elmo lost, the ballot counted
  for Ernie. Note that Oscar is ranked last on this
  ballot. Clearly this voter supported Ernie over
  Oscar as the Henson Company's new CEO, and it was
  important to register this preference rather than
  have the ballot be 'wasted' on Miss Piggy.

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Muppets Use IRV

• And Ernie is now the CEO of the Henson Production
  Company! If the Muppets had chosen the more
  traditional plurality voting system, a candidate
  could have been elected who most Muppets didn't
  like as much as Ernie.
• The use of instant runoff voting has assured the
  victory of a candidate with support of at least
  50 plus one vote.