Voting comes at a personal cost to people. It takes time to do effective research, if the voter see that as important. It also takes time to schedule when to go to the polls in a way that costs the least to them, in both time and resources. People need to wait in tedious lines to go through a process that may seem predetermined. The odds of someone actually being the defining vote of a certain election is different for each county, each state. But on either end of the spectrum, those odds are miniscule.

 

According to a Berkley University statistics project, the average American voter has a 1 in 60 million chance of being the decisive vote in a presidential election, and those odds are even more minuscule in the state of Alabama specifically.

 

However, there have been times were big choices hung in the balance of a few votes.

 

For example, Texas might not have become part of the U.S. back in 1845 if one senator had voted differently. 

 

Richard Nixon, not John F. Kennedy, would have won the presidential election in 1960 if one person from each polling place voted differently. 

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For a more recent example, the 2016 presidential election was decided by a mere 80,000 votes in three states, according to the Washington Post. For context, 57.6 million votes nationwide were cast, according to PEW Research Center.

 

So voting comes at a personal cost, and a few times one person’s vote makes a big difference, but people choose to vote anyway. Psychologists’ research reveals that this motivation could be a cocktail of habits and peer pressure, but voters of different levels of fame and political parties all have similar reasons of what motivates them to vote:

 

“Voting is something that, though integral to our country's foundational experiment, was not something everyone was able to do because of institutional oppression. Because of the intense struggles that many groups underwent to secure that right, exercising that right to vote is the essential culmination of those struggles. Not only that, but your voice is being heard through the practice of voting, and your voice is an important part of progressing forwards in our country.”-- Jillian Fantin, College Democrats, Samford University

 

“Voting is so important because it means exercising our right to democracy. It is a freedom that we should not take for granted” -- Lauren Canada, College Republicans, Samford University.

 

“Voting is a wonderful privilege, and by exercising your right to vote, you have the amazing opportunity to voice your personal opinion and participate in the selection of our newest elected officials. Remember that every vote matters and shares an equal degree of importance.” -- John H. Merrill, opening letter to 2018 Voter Guide

 

"Democracy doesn't wait for you to be bothered. It moves on as it rightly should and therefore the people who vote determine the direction of the country, determine the mood, the tone, and the people who stay out don't get a say, and I want every American to feel the power of that choice." -- Michelle Obama, When We All Vote event in Las Vegas