by David Lindfield
A Yale professor argued that America should consider giving younger voters greater political power, including potentially allowing young adults to cast proxy votes on behalf of children, while claiming parents may not be best positioned to represent their own kids’ interests.
Yale Law School professor Samuel Moyn floated the proposal during an appearance on the New York Times podcast “Interesting Times,” hosted by Ross Douthat.
Moyn was discussing his book “Gerontocracy in America,” which argues that older Americans have accumulated disproportionate control over wealth, housing, employment, and political power at the expense of younger generations.
“I’ve gotten in some hot water for proposing we consider overweighting the votes of younger people or assigning the youngest eligible voters proxy votes for the unrepresented children of our country,” Moyn said.
Douthat immediately asked the obvious question.
“Why not assign them to those children’s parents?”
Moyn rejected the idea.
“Because there’s a divergence of interests between parents and children,” he said.
“I think it’s likelier that young people—not people who are raising families—will have the best insight into the interests of children.”
Yale Professor Says Children Shouldn’t Be ‘Hostages’ Of Parents
Moyn went further, arguing that parents frequently mistake the interests of the family for those of their children.
“I think parents generally confuse the interests of their family with the interests of their children,” Moyn said.
“I think part of our goal as parents, but also as a society, is trying to make sure that children aren’t the hostages of their parents, as much as we rely on parents to raise them.”
Douthat rejected the argument outright.
“I think that’s daft,” he said.
“I think it’s absurd to imagine that a 24-year-old recent college graduate has a better assessment of the interests of my own children than I do.