Democratic discrimination: Minors’ voting rights, poorer households and inequality

Usually, across countries, relatively low-income households tend to have more children than higher-income households; this difference also holds between countries that have relatively high incomes versus low incomes. It’s also the case that the voting age in most countries coincides with the age at which one is no longer considered a minor but a fully-grown adult (16, 18 or 21, usually). Since it’s not just the individuals who vote but also the entire household that is affected by the government’s economic policies – the moral principle of affected interests, would seem to imply that children should be granted the vote. Poorer households have, on average, more children than wealthier households, by denying minors the right to vote, the law is essentially discriminating against poorer households and communities on the whole. Even though both wealthy and poor households are affected by the elected government’s policies, if we presume that both households have an equal number of adults (say, for example, 2), the average wealthier household would actually have a disproportionately higher voting power relative to its own size and the size of the average poorer household. So, if the poorer household had 2 adults and 3 minors (a total of 5) and the wealthier household had 2 adults and 2 minors (a total of 4), though the poorer household is larger and, therefore, more people are impacted by the government’s policies, their voting power is equal to the wealthier household’s since only the adults can vote. In this way, by denying ‘minors’ the right to vote, the wealthier household is favoured and the poorer household is discriminated against.

In many developing countries, there is a high fertility rate amongst both urban and agricultural communities when compared to their developed counterparts and, furthermore, within these poorer countries, the difference in the fertility rate between a wealthier and a poorer household is even larger than in a supposedly free, developed country. Therefore, denying minors the right to vote discriminates against poorer households even more so in developing countries than poorer households in developed ones and, by that same logic, favours the wealthy elite in the developing nations even more so than the wealthy in developed countries!

This has repercussions for subsequent policymaking and the government’s calculations for re-election next term. If those who are less fortunate have proportionally less self-determining power in elections than others, less attention will be paid to them in proportion to those biased proportions.

Furthermore, people are generally much younger in developing countries and when we consider that various diseases, poor employment opportunities, food shortages etc. might lead to a large number of children in many developing countries dying before they even reach the legislated voting age, it is imperative that they be given the chance for self-determination as soon as possible.

One could easily argue that although there are many minors who might be able to walk, talk and vote independently, there are still those who might be unable to do so in an adequate manner (such as newly born babies and toddlers). My suggestion would be to allow children to claim their right to vote whenever they feel ready rather than at some arbitrary, legally imposed age that results in biased representation of socioeconomic groups in elections.