Voter ID: An Example of Perspective

Voter ID is one of those topics where much of the public discussion is built around shared-experience viewpoints that fail to grasp the reality of the situation. Everyone has a driver's license! Voter fraud is bad! Let's require everyone show an ID in order to vote. Problem solved!

When you dive in, the truth is quite different. Around 10% of eligible voters don't have a license - that means over 10 million people! Voter fraud is nearly non-existent, with only a few dozen actual cases in the entire country over the past few elections. There is no problem to solve, but requiring ID's creates a problem for a very large number of people. How does this come about? Because people look at the world from their own perspective and rarely bother to check their reality against objective facts. For example:

I just renewed my CA driver's license and thought the experience might be helpful to relate some realities regarding voter ID laws. I didn't just renew my license, I upgraded to the new 'Real ID' which is going to be required for flying and probably the type of thing voter ID proponents want.
A Real ID requires proof of identity (passport or birth certificate), proof of Social Security (SS card), and proof of residency (utility bill). A Real ID application also has to be processed in person at the DMV. All told, the process was fairly simple and only a slight inconvenience for me. The 'for me' is the key part - let's see what that means.

I have a passport, but lots of people don't and the process to get one is both involved and slow (and costs $145). So I could have used my birth certificate. I didn't have a copy of my birth cert. I've moved over a dozen times in the past couple decades and lost it along the way. Spent an hour looking for it in file cabinets, boxes - no luck. I now live 1,500 miles from where I was born, but I could get a birth cert through mail (found this info online). It costs $30 and requires a notary (more time and money). I was actually visiting my mom, who still lives in the same county, so I did it in person. It took an hour, cost $30 (not including $300 flight), and required me to show my picture ID :)

I also managed to lose my Social Security card sometime over the years. I was able to order a replacement online (for free!) and it came in the mail 4 weeks later. For proof of residency, I needed to present a bill. Most of our bills are in my wife's name (she's the one who gets the paycheck), but the internet bill is in mine. Once I had the necessary paperwork I went online (gotta use that internet I pay for!) to fill out the application ahead of time (you can use the machines at the DMV for this). I tried to make an appt at the DMV to save time. Soonest option was 6 weeks away. Instead I went in without an appt. I'm rural, but close to town, which has the only DMV office within an hour's drive. At least half the people in my area are 10+ miles out and there's no public transportation. I drove my car - sucks if you don't have a car (which is fairly common among people without a driver's license). Our local DMV is widely renowned for its short wait times. Only took me an hour to get to the desk, show all my paperwork and have them process it. Cost $35.

That's it! In two weeks I should have a Real ID picture ID that will work for things like boarding a plane, entering a military base, or, presumably, voting.

Getting that ID took two months from when I started getting stuff ready. Cost $65 in direct costs (could easily cost more). I spent about four hours of my time working on this ID. Would have been longer if I didn't have internet at my house and a car to get around. For a lot of people, it would take a lot more time to track down paperwork, use public internet to get info, physically visit DMV, etc.
$65 isn't much for a middle-class American, and I didn't have to take off time from work. The cost of internet/vehicle/computer/printer is paid for anyway. $65 is real money, the food budget for a week for some folks, and the ID process could easily cost hundreds. Losing a day of work is even more money.

About 20% of Americans don't have internet access of any kind at home. Over half of all workers are hourly, most without Paid Time Off. About 20 million earn 'near-minimum' wage. People would have to start the ID acquisition process months ahead of any election and still might not complete it in time. The basic premise of voter ID laws is to disenfranchise millions of voters in order to prevent dozens of illegal votes. It's farcical on its face, and anti-democratic. When you think about voter ID (or anything, really), consider it from perspectives unlike your own. That's what empathy really means.