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= = = = =Voter Turnout: An Often Ignored Truth= = Taking a part in the election of our various government officials is one of our most important duties as American citizens. The results of said elections steer the course of our nation for the next several years. Such decions are even more important in recent times, when the country is not only in the midst of a recession, but is fighting a war on several fronts in the middle east. Such dramatic topics as health care reform, dangerous lack of security in our cities, and the controversial Kyleigh's Law reign supreme in today's headlines. As such, the general public opinion of our president has not been very favorable for the past several years. At the end of his second term in office, ex president George W. Bush had a public approval rating of only 22%. Congress had an even lower approval rating at this time. Even our current president, while currently having an approval rating over 50% has been dropping in recent months. With such a dissaproving nation, one would expect that citizens would be eager to vote for candidates they deem more competent. However, a startleingly low percentage of citizens of voting age actually participate in each election, often going just above or under 50% of able votes. Witth this in mind, data pertaining to election yurnout trends over the past several yeears has been gathered and analized in hopes of mathematically predicting the course of the public's future involvement in government elections.= = = == = = = = =The above scatter plots show the correlation between years of presidential and senate elections, represented by the x-axis, and percentage of legal voters, designated by the y-axis.= =So, as the country becomes more divided on certain subjects, ask yourself; What will the voter turnout be in the next major election? The nex big election will be in November of this year and there are many heated political races for the Senate, from California and Arizona to West Virginia and Pennsylvania. Does this mean that more people will turnout to vote on election day this year to support their candidate? Although statistics show that midterm elections do not have as big of a voter turnout as presidential elections, there is a big posibility that this election could have a very large turnout for a midterm election.=

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= = = = =National Voter Turnout in Federal Elections: 1960–2008= This table provides information about voter statistics, including age of voting population, voter registration, turnout, and more. population ||~ Voter registration ||~ Voter turnout ||~ Turnout of voting-age population (percent) || [|**http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0781453.html**] [|**http://elections.gmu.edu/voter_turnout.htm**]
 * ~ Year ||~ Voting-age
 * **2008*** || **231,229,580** || **NA** || **132,618,580*** || **56.8%** ||
 * 2006 || 220,600,000 || 135,889,600 || 80,588,000 || 37.1% ||
 * **2004** || **221,256,931** || **174,800,000** || **122,294,978** || **55.3** ||
 * 2002 || 215,473,000 || 150,990,598 || 79,830,119 || 37.0 ||
 * **2000** || **205,815,000** || **156,421,311** || **105,586,274** || **51.3** ||
 * 1998 || 200,929,000 || 141,850,558 || 73,117,022 || 36.4 ||
 * **1996** || **196,511,000** || **146,211,960** || **96,456,345** || **49.1** ||
 * 1994 || 193,650,000 || 130,292,822 || 75,105,860 || 38.8 ||
 * **1992** || **189,529,000** || **133,821,178** || **104,405,155** || **55.1** ||
 * 1990 || 185,812,000 || 121,105,630 || 67,859,189 || 36.5 ||
 * **1988** || **182,778,000** || **126,379,628** || **91,594,693** || **50.1** ||
 * 1986 || 178,566,000 || 118,399,984 || 64,991,128 || 36.4 ||
 * **1984** || **174,466,000** || **124,150,614** || **92,652,680** || **53.1** ||
 * 1982 || 169,938,000 || 110,671,225 || 67,615,576 || 39.8 ||
 * **1980** || **164,597,000** || **113,043,734** || **86,515,221** || **52.6** ||
 * 1978 || 158,373,000 || 103,291,265 || 58,917,938 || 37.2 ||
 * **1976** || **152,309,190** || **105,037,986** || **81,555,789** || **53.6** ||
 * 1974 || 146,336,000 || 96,199,0201 || 55,943,834 || 38.2 ||
 * **1972** || **140,776,000** || **97,328,541** || **77,718,554** || **55.2** ||
 * 1970 || 124,498,000 || 82,496,7472 || 58,014,338 || 46.6 ||
 * **1968** || **120,328,186** || **81,658,180** || **73,211,875** || **60.8** ||
 * 1966 || 116,132,000 || 76,288,2833 || 56,188,046 || 48.4 ||
 * **1964** || **114,090,000** || **73,715,818** || **70,644,592** || **61.9** ||
 * 1962 || 112,423,000 || 65,393,7514 || 53,141,227 || 47.3 ||
 * **1960** || **109,159,000** || **64,833,0965** || **68,838,2[[image:http://www.wikispaces.com/i/c.gif width="22" height="22" caption="Horizontal Rule"]]** || **63.1** ||

This is the regression for the senate election turnout: y=sin(31.4159265359x + 3.1415926535898) + 39.975**
 * This is the regression for the presidential election turnout: y=sin(31.4159265359x + 3.1415926535898) + 55.230769230769


 * As you can see, both are sine regressions. This is due to the fact that the voter turnout for the elections tends to meander up and down within a fairly limited range for each election, similar to a sine graph. The only other regression that moderately resembles this data in at least a small portion would be the cubic regression. However, this would be rather inacurate because it will eventually cause the percentages to continue to rise and approach infinite. We were forced to split the equation into two separate regressions because if it were one regression, the amplitude of the sine regression would fluctuate. In addition, when put into a calculator, the regression for the average voter turnout is produced, creating a graph which does not correlate accurately to any of the elections.

Questions:** 55.981% 40.96% Why do you think such a relatively low number of voters participate in each election?**
 * If the election turnout changes as predicted by the above regression, what will the turnout be at our next presidential election?**
 * If the election turnout changes as predicted in the above regression, what will the turnout be at our next senate election?
 * Do you feel that this is having a detrimental effect on the country as a whole?**