ABSTRACT
A person’s vote may be inconsequential or pivotal. When one votes, there is a very large chance of one’s vote having no effect on oneself or anybody else, together with a very small chance of pivoting the outcome of the election from a win by the party one votes against to win by the party one votes for, generating a modest benefit for oneself plus two massive externalities: a positive externality for the thousands, possibly even millions, of people who stand to gain from a win by the party one votes for, and a negative externality for the thousands, possibly even millions, of people who stand to gain from a win by the party one votes against.
