The Alternative Vote

Recent discussion of of various ways of voting has missed one point that I consider important: How much information can voters supply when they vote.

Under the prevailing system where we vote for just one candidate the number of valid ways of filling in a ballot paper equals the number of candidates.

Using the Alternative vote, where one may order as many candidates as one chooses, the number of valid submissions equals the factorial of the number of candidates.

So if there are 4 candidates for a seat, the present system allows to say one of just 4 things, whereas the Alternative vote would allow any of 24.