![]() ![]() One thing I did not know is that an amendment to the original US constitution was proposed by Madison. (The latter was at a whopping 1.80, but has since sharply reduced its assembly size.) Spain, Denmark, Switzerland, Portugal, and Mexico all get the cube root prize for having assembly sizes from. The five most oversized, all greater than 1.4, are France, Germany, UK (at 1.67), Sweden, and Hungary. The seven are:Īs expected, the mean ratio for the thirty-one countries is very close to one (0.992, with a standard deviation of. Taking actual size over expected size (from cube root), the USA has the seventh most undersized first or sole chamber among thirty-one democracies in my comparison set. However, there are some even more deviant cases. This recent static period is in contrast to earlier times, depicted by the zig-zag black line, in which the USA regularly adjusted House size, keeping it reasonably close to the cube-root expectation.Īt only about two thirds of the cube-root value of the population (as of 2010 census), the current US House is indeed one of the world’s most undersized. Note the flat line for the USA, indicating lack of increase in House size, since the population was less than a third what it is today. A nation’s assembly tends to be about the cube root of its population, as shown in this graph.* Backed by a theoretical model, it was originally proposed by Rein Taagepera in the 1970s. The strongest empirical relationship of which I am aware between population size and assembly size is the cube root law. The population per member in the lower house of other major countries is considerably smaller: Britain and Italy, 97,000 Canada and France, 114,000 Germany, 135,000 Australia, 147,000 and Japan, 265,000. ![]() Bush administrations and served on the staffs of Representatives Jack Kemp and Ron Paul”.Īccording to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the House of Representatives is on the very high side of population per representative at 729,000. The author is Bruce Bartlett, who “held senior policy roles in the Reagan and George H.W. We must also learn to be more discerning about our news sources and beware of “fake news” or “alternative facts,” which are propa- gated by people interested only in maximizing clicks, even if it means peddling lies and half-truths, or even by foreign governments using our own freedom of speech against us to pursue their own agenda at our expense.It is good to see the undersized nature of the US House of Representatives get attention in the New York Times‘s Economix blog. Rather, we must adapt to the evolving news landscape. Many people crave a simpler time before cable and the Internet, but of course it is impossible to put the toothpaste back in the tube. When it comes to politics, there is a growing tendency to obtain news only from sources favorable to one’s ideological or partisan point of view. Many simply tune out altogether and have become less informed about the news that affects them, while others consume only the sliver of news that interests them, whether it be sports, entertainment, or the stock market. But the average person is overwhelmed by the cacophony of information. News junkies love the proliferation of news outlets and the many new ways of obtaining it-on their phones, on Twitter, Facebook, and elsewhere. Newspapers have shrunk their news coverage drastically, the newsweeklies are shadows of their former selves, and the network eve- ning broadcasts are viewed by only a fraction of their previous viewership.Īt the same time, there are now a number of cable news channels that broadcast twenty-four hours a day, every day virtually every traditional news source is now available on the Internet and there are thousands of new Internet news sources constantly competing for our attention. Once upon a time, Americans could read their local newspaper, subscribe to a weekly newsmagazine, and watch thirty minutes of national news on television each night, and be reasonably sure they knew every- thing important and newsworthy that they needed to know to live their lives.
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