It would hurt the economy

The argument

Election day should not be made into a national holiday because doing so would take a toll on the economy. If election day were turned into a holiday, the economy would be hit by means of people not working and people getting paid to not work. Adding a new holiday to the calendar would be costly. Fewer people working means an entire day where business and economic productivity is down. Even worse, most propositions for turning election day into a federal holiday insists on it being a paid holiday. If election day is turned into a federal holiday, companies must workers additional vacation time, costing businesses money and productivity. If we look to federal workers, the economic situation turns worse. If election day is made into a new paid holiday, taxpayer money will fund their day off. It is estimated that every federal holiday costs taxpayers about half a billion dollars in wages paid to the country's 2.7 million federal employees. Election day should not be made into a national holiday. The model in place now does not come with the economic burden of having businesses shut down and having employees paid without work.

Premises

Counter-arguments

Election day should be made into a national holiday because the benefit of increased voter turnout outweighs any negative effects on the economy. According to John Conyers, a Democrat who represents Michigan's 13th District, "the cost of low voter participation for our democracy cannot be measured in financial terms." A presidential election determines the future of a country for four solid years. You can not place a price on the kind of impact that can be had in four years. Turning election day into a national holiday would minimize economic growth for a day, but it would be worth it. Not only would it be worth it, but the harm done to the economy would be minuscule and negligible. Countries like the United States can afford to have businesses shut down and pay workers for one day. Conyers says, "Though some might dismiss an Election Day holiday as being too expensive for our government to afford, the damage caused by low voter participation is a far greater risk." Voting is a right and there should be no restrictions put in place nor financial calculations made to make this right difficult to enact.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] Output on a holiday is not straightforwardly lost, since activity shifts rather than disappearing, and existing public holidays are not usually described as damage to the economy. The premise also assumes universal closure, when a holiday would leave essential services and much retail work running. [Rejecting P2] The half-billion figure is a wage bill already committed to salaried staff rather than an additional cost, and no comparison is offered — neither with what the present arrangement costs employees who lose pay to vote, nor with any estimate of the benefit. The counter's point that the value of participation is not measured in these terms is left unaddressed, and the conclusion requires a weighing the argument never performs.