APPORTIONMENT AND

VOTING
Apportionment
 A method of dividing a whole into various parts
 Has its roots in the US Constitution.
 Main question: How many voters must be
represented by each member of the house of
Representative?
 Equivalently, how many representatives must each
state send to the house based on its population?
Two Competing Plans (1790)
 The Hamilton Plan (Alexander Hamilton)
 The Jefferson Plan (Thomas Jefferson)

 Huntington-Hill Apportionment Method – has been

used since 1940 in apportioning the House of
Representative
The Hamilton Plan
Standard Divisor (D) – the number of voters
represented by each representative
D=

 Standard Quota (Q) – the whole number part of the

quotient when the population of the sub-group is
divided b the standard divisor
The Hamilton Plan
 In the case of the value of the Q is decimal, just
drop the decimal component of the value.
 If the total standard quota of all the sub-groups
does not equal to the number of apportion(or
number of representatives) review the calculation
of the standard quota and assign an additional
representative to the sub-group with the largest
decimal remainder. Continue this process until
you have reached the desired number of
representatives.
Example:
A total of 25 teacher aids are to be apportioned among the
seven classes at a new elementary school The enrollment in
each of the seven classes is shown in the following table.
Find the standard divisor and the standard quotient of each
class. Classes No . Of Students
Kindergarten 38
First grade 39
Second Grade 35
Third Grade 27
Fourth Grade 21
Fifth Grade 31
Sixth Grade 33
Total 224
The Jefferson Plan
 Uses a Modified standard divisor that yields the
correct number of representatives by trial and
error.
 The modified standard quotient is always the
smaller than the standard divisor.
Example:
A total of 25 teacher aids are to be apportioned among the
seven classes at a new elementary school The enrollment in
each of the seven classes is shown in the following table.
Find the standard divisor and the standard quotient of each
class. Classes No . Of Students
Kindergarten 38
First grade 39
Second Grade 35
Third Grade 27
Fourth Grade 21
Fifth Grade 21
Sixth Grade 33
Total 224
Example # 2
 In La Union province, there are six hospital. The hospital
district administrator have decided that 48 new nurses should
be apportioned based on the number of beds in each hospital.
The following table shows the number of beds in each
hospital.
Hospital No. of beds
A 242
B 356
C 308
D 190
E 275
F 410
CONT.
 Determine the standard divisor. What is the
meaning of the standard divisor in the context of
this exercise.
 Use the Hamilton and Jefferson method to
determine the number of nurses to be apportioned
to each hospital.
 How do the apportionment results produced using
the Jefferson method compare with the results
produced using the Hamilton method?
Criteria of Fairness for an Apportionment
 Quota Rule = the number of representative
apportioned to a state is the standard quota or one
more than the standard quota.

*** Hamilton ALWAYS satisfy this rule

*** Jefferson Plan sometimes satisfy this rule
Criteria of Fairness for an Apportionment
 Average Constituency = the average constituency
of the sub-group are approximately the same.

C should be a rounded to the nearest whole

Example:
 Using the two examples from the previous slides,
calculate the average constituency and can we say
that the subgroups are fairly represented?
Apportionment Principle
- this principle is applied when making a decision
regarding to which subgroup shall receive an
addition representative.
Apportionment Principle
 When adding a new representative to a sub-group, the
representative is assigned to the group in such a way it gives
the smallest relative unfairness of apportionment

Where R = Relative unfairness of apportionment

A is the absolute unfairness of apportionment = /C 1 – C2 /
C = is the average constituency of the sub-group receiving the new
representative.
Example:
 A company is planning to add a new sales
associates to one of its stores after noting a daily
increase in the number of customers(see the table),
Use the apportionment principles to determine
which store should receives the new employee.
Example:

Shopping Mall Number of Sales Average number of

Location Associates customers per day

SM Moa 587 5289

SM North Edsa 614 6219

Example#2
 The table below shows the number of first and second grade teachers in a
school district and the number of students in each of those grades. If a
new teacher is hired, use the apportionment principle to determine to
which grade the teacher should be assigned.

Number of Number of
teachers students
First Grade 512 12317
Second Grade 551 15439
Huntington-Hill Apportionment Method

 It is the current method of apportionment being applied by

House(US Congress).
 It is the method that makes use of Equal Proportions.
 When there is a choice of adding one representative to a number
of sub-group, the representative should be added to the sub-group
with the greatest HUNTINGTON NUMBER.

Where : PA is the population of subgroup A

a is the current number of representatives of sub-group A
Huntington-hill Apportionment Method

 Easy to do.
 It can be used in many subjects/subgroups
 It better to use over Relative Unfairness
Apportionment.
Example:
 The table shows the number of computers that are assigned to
four different schools and the number of students in those
schools. Using the huntington-hill apportionment principle to
determine to which school a new computer should be
assigned.
Schools Number of Number of
Computers students
A 26 625
B 22 532
C 26 670
D 31 754
Apportionment Paradoxes
1. Albama Paradox: even when population of sub-
groups do not change, one sub-group loses a
representative.
2. Population Paradox : a sub-group loses a
representative even when its population is
increasing faster than that of the other sub-groups.
3. New States Paradox : Some other sub-group lose or
gain a representative even when a number of
representatives was added to account for the new
sub-group’s population.
Which is the best Apportionment Method?

 Balinski-Young Impossibility Theorem

Any apportionment method either will violate the
quota rule or will produce paradoxes.
Voting
Methods of Voting
1. Plurality Method of Voting
2. Borda Count Method
3. Plurality by Elimination
4. Pairwise comparison Voting Method
5. Majority Voting
Plurality Method
 Each voter votes for one candidates, and the
candidate with the most votes wins. The winning
candidate does not have to have a majority of the
votes.
Plurality Method
 Each voter votes for one candidates, and the
candidate with the most votes wins. The winning
candidate does not have to have a majority of the
votes.
 Majority Vote: over 50 % of the people voting must
vote for the candidate
Plurality Method
 Each voter votes for one candidates, and the
candidate with the most votes wins. The winning
candidate does not have to have a majority of the
votes.
 Majority Vote: over 50 % of the people voting must
vote for the candidate
 Limitation of Plurality Method: Alternative choices
are not considered.
Borda Count Method of Voting
If there are n candidates or issues in an election, each
voter ranks the candidates or issues by giving n
points to the voter’s first choice, n-1 points to the
voter’s second choice and so on, with the voter’s
least favorite choice receiving 1 points. The
candidate or issue that receives the most total
points is the winner.
Example:
Fifty People were asked to rank their preferences of five
varieties of chocolate candy, using 1 for their favorite and 5
for their least. Using the Plurality method which variety of
candy would win the taste of the 50 people.
Variety RANKINGS
CARAME 5 4 4 4 2 4
L
VANILLA 1 5 5 5 5 5
ALMOND 2 3 2 1 3 3
TOFFEE 4 1 1 3 4 2
SOLID 3 2 3 2 1 1
NUMBER 17 11 9 8 3 2
OF
VOTERS
Plurality with Elimination Method
 First, eliminate the candidate with the fewest number
of first-place votes
 If two or more of these alternative have the same
number of first-place votes, all are eliminated unless
that would eliminate all alternatives. In that case, a
different method of voting will be used.
 Adjust the voter’s ranking at the remaining
candidates.
 Repeat the same process of elimination and
adjustment until two candidates are left.
Pairwise Comparison Voting Method

 The “head-to-head method”

 Each candidate is compared one-on-one with each
of the other candidates
 A candidate receives 1 point for a win, 0.5 points
for a tie and 0 points for a loss.
 The candidate with the greatest number of points
wins the election.