In 2002 the Help America Vote Act was passed to replace punch card ballots, establish the Election Assistance Commission, support voter registration, and more. It is true that punch card ballots and lever-based ballots cause problems for voters. However, the fundamental problems of usability and design have not been solved by Congress. As David Kimball, an election usability researcher has said:


Research-based ballot design is essential to a healthy democracy. However, the U.S. government has paid little attention to it. In a perfect world, every ballot would be user tested by usability professionals before certification. Unfortunately, that may not be practical, but implementing required ballot design standards would be.

NIST, the government's standards agency has a Style Guide for Voting System Documentation. If NIST can create guidelines for documenting voting systems, then NIST can also create guidelines for designing ballots. Plenty of research has already been done that could serve as a starting point.

In addition to reducing voting errors, ballots that are easy to use would also make voting faster, because when something is easier to use, it tends to be faster to use too. This means less standing in line as others ponder which button to press or which oval to fill in. In fact, for every 5 seconds saved per ballot on November 4, Americans collectively would save 275 YEARS of standing in line!*

*Assuming: 130,000,000 voters, 1/3 absentee ballots, and an average line size 20 people deep