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Apple Providing U.S. Employees With Up to Four Hours Paid Time Off to Vote in November Election
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In Europe not all elections are always held at the weekend at all. In the UK a voting station / polling station opens at 7am in the morning, and closes at 10pm in the evening. Surely anyone can attend without effort, and if you really can't you can submit a postal vote, or have a proxy vote.
I appreciate it can vary from state to state, but I agree. Unless the voting stations only open from 10am until 2pm or something it seems rather ridiculous to me.
Yup it is already there such systems, and what is this before they have been encoded. Why wouldn't you design it such that it is signed at source? Likewise there is no need for a single point of failure at all. Ever heard about distributed computing? Yes, Twitter had a breach indeed, a human breach, you wouldn't design a voting system like that, that would be a bit silly and architecturally not right.
That requires backing up by some evidence otherwise it is just argumentum ad hominem.
??? You seem to be making some wild assumptions about it being a badly design system like it can't be done properly. Considering you seem to suggest 'ultimately by people' which is a flawed argument instantly.
That makes literally no sense whatsoever. And again if you refer to '...an entire field of experts proclaiming...electronic votings, is a bad idea' you really should back that up with some evidence. Sure I can see that there may be some challenges around social inclusion potentially, but that even that is up for debate. I mean was it not that in 2012 more people voted (electronically) in American Idol than in the Presidential Election...https://www.itv.com/news/2012-05-24/x/
Voting is nowhere near as complex as an application, happens all the time at scale.
As above more people voted in 2012 for American Idol electronically than in the Presidential Election...But hey if you (as an engineer) trust pencil and paper more than a digitally signed vote then I don't think we'll ever going to agree on this.
The fact that recounts are necessary at times just says it all about the inherent flaw in the system. Sure it is employed in many places, that doesn't mean it can't be improved, be more secure, accurate, and convenient.
Weird that in the US it seems that you have electoral voting on a day other than a Saturday.
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Yes, you get fined. Unless you can prove you had voted or didn't choose to vote as you hold a conciencious objection.
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Doesnt Canada also have an embargo on reporting on the election? The US needs that as well. Its a smart idea.
This doesn’t reinforce the stability ans security of online voting systems (as I don’t see a foreign state attempting to hack the American Idol system). Rather it simply points to the lack of priorities of the American people. I for one have voted in every election since I reached voting age but have never voted for American Idol or any other reality tv show.
Simple answer to your question: Australia has the best voting system on earth, and the rest of the democratic world (especially the US) is too slow to learn from them. (Note: I'm not an Aussie).
Hopefully one day the rest of the free world will adopt things like public holidays for elections, majoritarian voting systems, etc.
Until that happens, I hope more employers take a note from Apple and give a short amount of PTO to vote. It is, literally, the least they can do as businesses operating in a democratic society.
Fun fact: The secret ballot is also known as the "Australian" ballot because they pioneered it.
Nice of Apple. I wonder if 4 hours will be enough time. I'm serious:
I live in a conservative small city. We have 8 polling places for 20,000 total population. I'll be in and out in less than 10 minutes - at 5:00 PM. But, because of a reduction in polling places in major urban areas, wait times could be 8 hours there. In inclement weather. It's concerning that we make it much, much harder for some people to vote.
I live in a conservative small city. We have 8 polling places for 20,000 total population. I'll be in and out in less than 10 minutes - at 5:00 PM. But, because of a reduction in polling places in major urban areas, wait times could be 8 hours there. In inclement weather. It's concerning that we make it much, much harder for some people to vote.
In my state, polling places are open for 14 hours. Unless one works a 14 hour shift those 14 hours should provide a window for people to vote. And if one works a 14 hour shift, one could still get a mail-in-ballot.
A four hour window seems generous to me. My polling place is 10 minutes away and I get there at 7am...in and out. I know it's not that way everywhere or as convenient everywhere.
It has been proven several times now that mail in voting is very fraudulent. If you really want your vote to count, and I'm sure we all do, you should be against this and push for voter ID.
Great. Please provide a link from a credible source proving your assertion that mail-in voting is very fraudulent.
I do understand why some people do not want to see mail-in voting take hold.
It is highly unlikely that “the greatest country on Earth” is unable to organise voting by mail. It has also been debunked several times and there’s no proof whatsoever this happens.
Why would anyone go through all the hoops and take the risk of casting one (!) extra vote?
It’s also very intriguing it’s only one party claiming this fraud is real, as if everybody that would commit this fraud, surely votes for the opposing party.
In my country in Europe, voting is mandatory. Booths are open on Sunday, and are located in your own neighbourhood. Waiting times vary between 0 and 15 minutes. It’s all not that complicated to organise.
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I have voted in several states and several cities, and never has the process taken even a half hour.
Photo ID, and voting in person should be the standard. Any thing else leaves too much room for fraud.
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Absolutely not, and I have already clarified why.
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What is "cheapening" participation? Is an economic sacrifice a requirement for making a valid vote? Does imposing some sort of price/penalty ensure that a vote will be more reasoned?
Not everyone works on Tuesday - some don't work Tuesdays because of their employment schedule. Others are retired, unemployed, or otherwise are free to take the time to vote without losing wages. To level the playing field, should they pay some sort of economic cost so that their vote is more reasoned/valuable?
A nominally democratic society has a choice - give everyone a voice with no barriers and let the chips fall where they may, or take steps to "ensure the quality" of the ballots. Only, what criteria are used to ensure that quality? That will always be the rub.
Yes, philosophically speaking, an educated, reasoning electorate is good for self-government. If we're going to make choices that affect ourselves and others, they ought to be intelligent choices (well, at least people who believe in the value of intelligence prefer intelligent choices). However, we know people don't always make intelligent choices. Regardless of our intelligence, we also make emotional choices. And, of course, nearly all our choices are a mixture of reason and emotion. We're human.
We can't decide whether one person's vote is more or less intelligent. If there was one, incontrovertible "intelligent" choice on the ballot, then it isn't a free and open election. All we do when we talk about intelligent votes is make assumptions about whether we think a person is likely to make an intelligent decision, in our personal opinions.
So I don't question Apple's (or any other company's) willingness to allow its workers to vote on company time - in a democracy everyone ought to be able to cast a ballot with ease. The more, the merrier. Otherwise, it's no longer democracy. The question is why more employers don't do that, regardless of that employer's stated (or unstated) philosophies. I don't see it as "paying employees to vote" - I see it as a contribution to the quality of democracy.
So long as the employer makes no attempt to influence how those employees vote, I don't see a problem. Obviously, paying someone to vote in a particular way (whether it's an employer, political party, or anyone else for that matter) is a different problem, but that can't be separated from the notion of "voting in ones economic interest" - does it really matter whether one is paid in advance to place a vote, or whether one is promised an economic benefit for voting in a particular way?
The notion that there's something wrong with a "curated" workforce is ludicrous. It is in every employer's best interest to select workers who will advance the business. Otherwise, every job opening from bottom to top would be first-come, first-served. Hold a lottery for job applicants, with no resumes or qualifications required. If you're suggesting that Apple somehow "curates" its workforce so that it reflects a single political viewpoint...
Paying someone cheapens the vote because they should do it out of civic duty. Paying removes an artificial barrier that prevents someone from being able to vote. So yeah, one could argue that doing your part to participate should not come at the cost of another.
I am not judging how educated a voter is, but if you pay someone to vote than you increase the likelihood that someone will vote. Their voice isn't being represented because they don't know what they are saying. For these people their best return is to get through voting ASAP without thinking.
Apple's curation means they just unloaded a large workforce on the ballet that likely agrees with them. But they didn't provide those resources to people who work in industries where the majority of people disagree with Apple leadership. They paid money to people who would likely sway the votes in their favor. It doesn't matter if they did so in such a way that actually impacts the vote - all that matter is that their series of policies impacted the election. Since Apple employees are still on the clock when voting they represent Apple while at the polls the same way that an on the clock employee represents Apple when they visit a strip club or a bar. As long as they are being paid their actions are a reflection of the corporation and not just of themselves. And Apple has to be documenting this in order to pay them.
That is the really big issue with paying employees to vote. The reason no employer should do it is because not the company has a list of people who they paid to vote, and as a result they could use it to influence career development.
If you think their is a lot of political divide within Apple...
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Couldn't disagree more with this comment. As your opinion seems to be the employees who not will go out to vote will vote as they are told to do, I am of the opinion, the employees who go out to vote will exercise the civic duty free from any influence from their employer. Of course, what could happen is a large pool of voters who never went in the past could upset the outcome with the numbers...but that is a good thing.Absolutely not, and I have already clarified why.
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Paying someone cheapens the vote because they should do it out of civic duty. Paying removes an artificial barrier that prevents someone from being able to vote. So yeah, one could argue that doing your part to participate should not come at the cost of another.
I am not judging how educated a voter is, but if you pay someone to vote than you increase the likelihood that someone will vote. Their voice isn't being represented because they don't know what they are saying. For these people their best return is to get through voting ASAP without thinking.
Apple's curation means they just unloaded a large workforce on the ballet that likely agrees with them. But they didn't provide those resources to people who work in industries where the majority of people disagree with Apple leadership. They paid money to people who would likely sway the votes in their favor. It doesn't matter if they did so in such a way that actually impacts the vote - all that matter is that their series of policies impacted the election. Since Apple employees are still on the clock when voting they represent Apple while at the polls the same way that an on the clock employee represents Apple when they visit a strip club or a bar. As long as they are being paid their actions are a reflection of the corporation and not just of themselves. And Apple has to be documenting this in order to pay them.
That is the really big issue with paying employees to vote. The reason no employer should do it is because not the company has a list of people who they paid to vote, and as a result they could use it to influence career development.
If you think their is a lot of political divide within Apple...
At any rate, these opinions are speculations. Speculations are always fun to discuss.
Tell that to Joe and John Kennedy, who are well known to have bought young John his first seat even without a nice easy paper trail to check people voted as they were paid to do.
There's a fine of, IIRC, $50 or so for federal elections and a similar amount varying by state for state elections, and a list of the 25 acceptable excuses for not voting. The real punishment is having to write out a letter explaining your excuse or waste an afternoon on a work day hanging around the magistrates court, rather than 20 minutes (if you're unlucky) voting.
Also Australia allows voting in person at any polling station in the country plus at consulates and most embassies/high commissions, without prior booking or anything for federal elections, and most states allow voting anywhere in the state.
I am not really sure what there is to disagree with.
- Apple selected employees with similar ideologies as them.
- Apple rejected applicants with ideologies that differed from them.
- Apple says they will pay for their employees, who hold similar opinions, to go vote and work the polls.
- Apple will not pay for other employees, who disagree with the largest most profitable corporation in the worlds opinions, to go vote and work the polls.
- In order to pay employees Apple will have to document that they received time off to vote.
- During the voting process Apple Employees will be on the clock, meaning that behaviors that Apple disproves of can directly or indirectly be used for termination.
None of this is speculative.
If Apple was required to employ anyone who applied, or if they paid for anyone who wanted to vote without condition of employment, than this would feel more like increasing voter turnout. That, clearly, is not at all what Apple is doing. They made it easier for a group of people they are already familiar with to go vote knowing that those people are likely to vote a certain way.
It's not about getting more people to vote. It's about Apple ensuring that the people they want voting vote. They could have identified areas where voter turnout is lowest and then paid the people in those areas to vote. But then they would have less control over who they voted for. Which as I showed, they controlled since the day the employee applied.
None of this is a good thing.
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Fact: Apple is paying employees up to 4 hours of their time to vote.
Speculation: How they will vote.
Is that concise enough?
And yes, this is a good thing.
Fact: Only employing people who vote in Apple's favor.
Even more concise.
Good for Apple.
Sorry that's speculation and pretty sure an illegal hiring practice.
I don't believe Apple asks potential candidates about their voting preferences as part of an interview.
They ask them questions to see if they to fit their corporate culture.Different questions, same outcome. They are looking for people who all think a similar way.
Nope. Not even close. Fitting into a corporate culture has nothing to do with exercising your right as a citizen to vote. If in your anecdotal experience it does, I certainly would like to hear about how everybody voted exactly the same way.
Your thoughts, imo, are very off-base.
If you really can't see that Apple has the final say over who works for them than you are just trolling.