India has a better solution: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-india-election-lone-voter...

It works in India because elections are federally managed , and poll workers are federal employees who have to do the duty .

In US the rules are per state and complicated also while mostly paid poll workers are really volunteering for the job .

The second part surprises me all the time , US May have lesser polling booths if they have lesser people volunteer to be poll workers . Despite collecting so much tax and have so many government employees , Election Day in the US depends on so much on volunteers

Election Day is also not a national holiday . I am sure the country can afford a single day off every 2/4 years so people can vote . You don’t even need an extra holiday, Keep it on 4th July if you have to, what better to celebrate independence than casting your vote ?

Free and fair elections is the foundation of democracy, with all the gerrymandering , ID rules , mail-in ballot issues, voter suppression I am not sure how free and fair US elections truly are and how much of the population they truly are represented

States are there to implement federal guidelines as well as their own. Nothing stops the US federal government from passing a constitutional amendment or a law that forces this type of setup. Aside from the corruption you mentioned lol

Constitutional changes have to be ratified by at least 3/4 of the states so not really under federal government, unless the states buy-in as well.

Of course it is lack of political will to make changes that is always the problem.

In this case there is no intent as well. It is like congress voting its own salary? It took 202 years to pass the 27th Amendment after all and it has the just most basic of safeguards on compensation.

The legislation governing legislators such as election laws, salary, term limits etc should not be controlled by them, this is a major flaw in many democratic systems.

That's very perceptive. Thanks for bringing that up. If that truly is part of the case, it's even more dastardly than I thought.

Whats wrong with sending a ballot via UPS?

There are, at least in theory, pretty serious federal laws in place to prevent tampering with, or delaying, the mail.

Moreover, it's a completely neutral service - a ballot from Berkley, CA is treated identically in terms of priority as one from Amarillo, TX.

In a world where UPS gets to serve however they see fit, it's perfectly legal for the company to prioritize one over the other in terms of prompt delivery or to prioritize care that the mail arrives unmolested.

This is most important imo. We are granted certain protections with USPS that will likely never exist with private carriers.

The USPIS needs probably cause to open your mail, as it's protected under the Fourth Amendment.

Meanwhile at Fedex or UPS, the little old nosy lady at the counter can bust into any package she finds "suspicious". And you have no recourse.

I'm not sure how many people realize this.

You've heard those stories where the odds in a lotto get lopsided right?

Well sometimes a lotto game ends up with a flaw that allows an arbitrage opportunity - you can fill out every combination and walk away with a few hundred thousand or a few million. A small group of people spend incredible efforts, seemingly irrationally, to fill out every possible lotto combo...

Now imagine that lottery is for president of the United States.

Effectively if you can intercept and alter ballots, you only have to change the 'right precincts' to flip an election.

I'd imagine UPS (a courier) is a fair bit more expensive than USPS (a national postal service)?

The USPS is subsidized to keep prices low, and furthermore is a public institution which seems to be a clear benefit for mail-in ballots.

The USPS receives no government subsidies and for example pays property taxes. There are a lot of government mandates about what they can or can’t do, but it doesn’t currently receive federal funds.

cost and ease