Top Preferences with Set Points
Sometimes you and your friends have to make a choice among many possible options. We see this in the selection of the Most Valuable Player of a sports league like MLB or NBA, where any player that plays in the league would be eligible to win. We would like to have a fast method to select a winner that also shows people’s preferences.
For the NBA MVP selection, the voters, made up of sportswriters and broadcasters, vote for their top five choices:
4th-place vote = 3 points; 5th-place vote = 1 point. Source: Business Insider.
So instead of before — asking everyone for one selection, or give a point distribution for all choices — we can ask each group member to give their first choice and second choice. We then make a fixed assignment of points. For instance, each first-place vote = 10 points and each second-place vote = 4 points.
Use this voting method for your restaurant choices. Choose the number of top choices each person can make and set the point assignments. Do you get a new winner?
Questions to Ponder:
(1) If you have only few choices to select a winner from, would you choose this voting method?
(2) Could such a voting lead to a tie? If so, what would you do?
(3) What is your favorite voting method? Could you come up with a better one?
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