# A mathematical look at gerrymandering **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [February 27, 2024, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182 "2024-02-27T19:56:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/21 "2024-02-27T23:24:24Z")
As evidenced by: > This is indeed a gerrymander, but it is what is called a beneficial gerrymander. Well, yes. Beneficial to the people it benefits. Not necessarily anyone else. How do we decide which groups deserve to benefit and which don’t? That’s up to our value system and has nothing to do with math. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/22 "2024-02-27T23:26:30Z")
Frequently there are conflicting goals when it comes to fairness and trade offs need to made. You’ll get no argument from me there. For the most part, I am not proposing a solution to the gerrymandering problem. I am describing a method to quantify it. I’m not even saying it’s the only method. When the median district in a legislative map does not resemble the mean district that map is unfair. No smoke. No mirrors. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/23 "2024-02-27T23:28:45Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > Well, yes. Beneficial to the people it benefits. Not necessarily anyone else. How do we decide which groups deserve to benefit and which don’t? That’s up to our value system and has nothing to do with math. I have no argument with any of that. It’s not really the point, but yes something that benefits a group might not benefit a different group. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/24 "2024-02-27T23:30:04Z")
> [@Lance\_Turbo](#): > > Random walks. See Dr. Moon Duchin. To generate the boundaries? Won’t work. Random walks will generally end up self-intersecting, which boundaries can’t do. And where do you start the walks? And how do you ensure that the resulting districts all have the same population, as is required of legislative districts? There are answers to each of these questions, of course, but there are many different answers to them. > [@Lance\_Turbo](#): > > You put forth something about geographical closeness being an important consideration and I would like to see more if you could provide it. I am interested in your idea and would like you to expand on it. There are many interests that people who live geographically near each other will have in common. They all want the roads that go to their geographical area to be well maintained. They all want the schools close to that area to be high quality. They all want services like grocery stores to be easily accessible. None of them will want a rendering plant, paper mill, or other odoriferous enterprise upwind of them. A representative representing a well-defined geographic area will try to meet these interests. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/25 "2024-02-27T23:30:48Z")
This is straight bonkers. Do you think Colorado’s mean state House district’s similarity to to Colorado’s median state House district is somehow due to ski resorts? How would that even work? ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/26 "2024-02-27T23:31:39Z")
Proportional representation has its drawbacks, too. Under proportional representation you’d get a lot of fringe parties getting representation, such as Proud Boys, American Freedom, Libertarians, and Communists, as well as more respectable parties like the Greens. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/27 "2024-02-27T23:36:33Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > To generate the boundaries? Won’t work. It does, in fact, work. Here’s a short Scientific American article by Dr. Duchin that explains it: [Geometry versus Gerrymandering | Scientific American](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/geometry-versus-gerrymandering/) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/28 "2024-02-27T23:36:53Z")
> [@Lance\_Turbo](#): > > This is straight bonkers. Do you think Colorado’s mean state House district’s similarity to to Colorado’s median state House district is somehow due to ski resorts? How would that even work? It’s possible that the country as a whole has tendencies which structurally benefit Republicans, but that Colorado specifically also has tendencies which structurally benefit Democrats, and they just happen to roughly cancel out in Colorado. But some of those other tendencies might or might not generalize to other states. It’s possible that there are political factors involved in people living in towns supported by tourism (though I don’t know enough of the details to guess what those factors would be), and those could certainly be relevant. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/29 "2024-02-27T23:37:12Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > There are many interests that people who live geographically near each other will have in common. No doubt. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Wiggler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/red_wiggler/32/13190_2.png) [@Red\_Wiggler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Wiggler)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/30 "2024-02-27T23:37:23Z")
Not a problem with a reasonable threshhold. Sticking with the current federal cap of 435 (which we shouldn’t!), a five-member district of about 3.5 million would require fringe candidates to earn around 350,000 votes. That’s enough to justify representation imho. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/31 "2024-02-27T23:40:46Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > It’s possible that the country as a whole has tendencies which structurally benefit Republicans, but that Colorado specifically also has tendencies which structurally benefit Democrats, and they just happen to roughly cancel out in Colorado. This is definitely a possibility. It’s not the most parsimonious explanation though. Furthermore, no one has demonstrated a tendency exists so it’s definitely a bridge too far to posit that Colorado is unique or in any way special and that is the reason why it bucks the trend. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/32 "2024-02-27T23:41:57Z")
If I bring in a cow to keep my room warm, my pet mice will be safe. If I bring in a pack of bobcats, my mice will be in danger. From a mathematical perspective, it’s fun and interesting to come up with a methodology of quantifying risk so that I can bring in the greatest number of the most threatening animals that keeps my mice alive to the exact minimum allowable threshold. But from the vantage of being a mouse, just bring in the cow and stop fussing about with things that shouldn’t be a worry to begin with. The right answer isn’t the math. It’s in only electing people who will vote to put in a non-partisan commission that’s fully empowered to draw up the districts, impartially. Everything else is navel gazing. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/33 "2024-02-27T23:44:23Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > The right answer isn’t the math. It’s in only electing people who will vote to put in a non-partisan commission that’s fully empowered to draw up the districts, impartially. Everything else is navel gazing. How are you measuring the effectiveness of these non-partisan commissions? Surely they are not infallible. Don’t you want to know? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/34 "2024-02-27T23:49:17Z")
> [@Lance\_Turbo](#): > > This is definitely a possibility. It’s not the most parsimonious explanation though. > > Furthermore, no one has demonstrated a tendency exists… If your third sentence were true, then your second sentence would also be true. But it has been demonstrated that urban concentration does give Republicans a structural advantage. The percentage of Democrats in cities is much higher than the percentage of Republicans in rural areas. This inherently gives Republicans an advantage. If Colorado nevertheless manages to be fair, then there must, necessarily, be some other advantage that Democrats there enjoy, that balances this out. And until you figure out what that advantage is, it’s impossible to tell whether it can be extended to the rest of the country or not. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Wiggler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/red_wiggler/32/13190_2.png) [@Red\_Wiggler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Wiggler)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/35 "2024-02-27T23:51:36Z")
“Non-partisan-drawn” maps will get sued, too. We need real and fair competition and humans can’t provide that with single member districts. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/36 "2024-02-27T23:57:05Z")
> [@Lance\_Turbo](#): > > Surely they are not infallible. Don’t you want to know? I’ve spent lots of hours of my life finding numbers on the internet and analyzing them. And, likewise, I’ve felt the pang of sadness when the numbers that I needed weren’t available anywhere to be found. But there’s always going to be problems in the world and imperfections. And, likewise, there’s always (ignoring transhumanism) going to be a minority of folk who can do math and a smaller group who can do it honestly and fairly. You can’t split them between too many things, when there are so few. If we can knock the issue off of the top of the issue list, I’d be fine to have those people concerned with the new top items. If they have free time to analyze the after effects of the new Constitutional Amendment then, by all means, I’ll check through it for anything interesting. But I’m willing to trust that a good system will lead to good enough results. And if we can’t detect any flaw with it minus some hardcore math, it’s probably not needful of first-level attention. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/37 "2024-02-27T23:58:18Z")
> [@Lance\_Turbo](#): > > Do you think Colorado’s mean state House district’s similarity to to Colorado’s median state House district is somehow due to ski resorts? I’m being a _little_ tongue in cheek, but Aspen, etc. definitely put their thumb on the scale. Even Utah has Park City (a rare blue blip on their electoral map), but that’s not enough to overcome the overall demographic differences there. My point is just what **Chronos** said, which is that Colorado has certain very specific geographic factors that support a very specific kind of tourism that tends to lean blue. That’s not the only thing going on there, but it’s one of them. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2024, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/38 "2024-02-27T23:58:35Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > But it has been demonstrated that urban concentration does give Republicans a structural advantage. By who? In this thread? Even so, I’m not saying there is no structural advantage, I’m saying if there is one, we have proof that it can be overcome. It may be that I lucked into the one most special case where that structural advantage can be overcome, but that’s not the way William of Ockham is leaning. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2024, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/39 "2024-02-28T00:00:16Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > I’m being a _little_ tongue in cheek, but Aspen, etc. definitely put their thumb on the scale. Less than 7,000 people live in Aspen. > [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > My point is just what **Chronos** said, which is that Colorado has certain very specific geographic factors that support a very specific kind of tourism that tends to lean blue. Tourists don’t vote. ---
**Author:** ![Aspenglow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspenglow/32/76_2.png) [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2024, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182/40 "2024-02-28T00:09:01Z")
Moderating: > [@Red\_Wiggler](#): > > I hope I can talk people into supporting the belief that proportional representation IS the best representation. It’s why almost all of the world’s better democracies (I believe we’ve slipped to No. 29) use a form of PR. I have not closely reviewed this thread for violations and there may be more. To all: This this thread is about gerrymandering and not about other systems that would obviate the need for drawing district lines. Please drop the proportional representation hijack. Thanks. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-mathematical-look-at-gerrymandering/998182.md?page=3)