Its title reads at a 19th-grade level, and its summary reads at a 24th-grade level.
What the hell Axios?
You might need a college degree to read a ballot, but you need a Slop degree to make sense of Axios
They explain what absurdly high “grades” mean earlier in the article.
- The national average is 17th grade, about the level of a first-year graduate student, according to Ballotpedia.
- Colorado’s ballots rank hardest at a 33rd-grade level, theoretically 17 years of schooling beyond a bachelor’s degree.
I have to assume this is part of a standardized reading-level scale, not something they made up for the article.
Oh, I think they made it up. Most PhD’s “only” need 10-12 years of school after High School. 33rd Grade isnt a thing at all.
Long words and long sentences can get non-sensical “grade levels” out of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flesch–Kincaid_readability_tests#Flesch–Kincaid_grade_level
If the average word is 4 syllables and the average sentence is 4 words, that gives a “grade level” of 33+. I imagine the problem with the ballot measures are extremely long sentences. Lists, conditions, and lists of conditions all make for very long sentences that can still not require any sort of advanced vocabulary. If the average sentence is 65 words and the average word is just 2 syllables, you still get a 33+ “grade level”.
So it has nothing to do with the content at all, just how many words are in sentences, and how many syllables are in those words. A twelve year old with a penchant for run-on sentences (and a thesaurus) could invent a “33rd-grade” sentence if they put their mind to it.
It’s actually dumber than if they had an AI grade it for readability.
That’s like saying the ability to have theoretical shoe sizes for giants makes practical shoe sizes useless. In reality, the hypothetical text you’re describing that breaks the scale isn’t something we need to worry about.
And yet, I’ve seen it touted as a useful, if approximate, metric since I was in secondary school last century (1990s).
Sometimes the “dumbest” stuff gets used just because it’s a translation to the “standard” number line. I don’t know which, if either, was the cause and which was the effect, but it kind of thinking strongly correlates with a “number go up” / infinite growth measure of success.
Which should tell you something when we have ballots that go that far off the scale. It’s not an accident.
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If I could venture a guess, either the article is slop or the editor is slop.
The majority of US adults read below a 6th grade level (source). To put it into perspective, Dungeons and Dragons is written for a highschool reading level.
Even though I have some graduate work, I’m always glad to get the Arkansas ballot measure explainers from: https://www.youtube.com/@ArkanSense
Perhaps an ambitious Kansan or Missourian could do such a project for future ballot measures.
I also hate things like “33rd grade”, which make no damn sense, but are likely just blind application of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flesch–Kincaid_readability_tests#Flesch–Kincaid_grade_level if not outright “AI hallucinations”.
EDIT: Correct nominative for a citizen of Missouri, per replies.
Missourian.
So, this is the proposal the article claims is the most challenging:
A “yes” vote will amend the Missouri Constitution to establish the “Show-Me Prosperity Fund,” a permanent public endowment fund to support state government with the goal of eliminating state-imposed taxes without impairing the real value of the fund’s principal; prohibit the General Assembly from appropriating or diverting monies from the fund until notification is given by the State Treasurer that the net investment earnings of the fund are sufficient to eliminate state-imposed taxes; cap the total amount of moneys that may be appropriated from the fund in a fiscal year to three percent of the average market value of the fund over the preceding five fiscal years; and prohibit the General Assembly from enacting the eliminated state-imposed taxes, provided, however, that in the event the fund is unable to meet its obligations due to insolvency, revenue shortfall, or program failure, the General Assembly shall retain full authority to appropriate funds from any lawful source and to enact legislation establishing or increasing taxes or other revenues as necessary.
A “no” vote will not amend the Missouri Constitution to establish a permanent public endowment fund to support state government with the goal of eliminating state-imposed taxes.
If passed, this measure will have no immediate impact on taxes but could lead to the elimination of state-imposed taxes if the net investment earnings of the fund become sufficient to support that outcome.
This seems pretty straightforward (basically a pension fund to offset taxes, if I’m reading it correctly), but I could picture maybe 50+% of the population having difficulty exactly grasping what they’re going for.
From what I can tell, there isn’t necessarily a limit on what can be made a ballot initiative, but it makes me feel wonder if there is a certain point where the public should or shouldn’t have a say on specific issues. If the US would enter a significant depression, and this tax program was in place, all of a sudden, Missourians would either get hit by a surprise sales tax or have to pay state tax out of pocket unexpectedly. The people that would have a hard time understanding the text of this ballot question would probably be hot disproportionately harder. I feel enough ballot questions are misleading to begin with (I typically vote against open space preservation in my area because it sounds like it pays wealthy landowners to just hold onto their property rather than sell to developers or to build sports parks for private leagues rather than preserving specific ecosystems of need), but voting on a significant structure of the tax system kinda feels like something that might be better left to experts than the average joe.
I don’t remember if I had a specific point or am just thinking out loud, but I don’t like ballot questions. It feels like the government just passing the responsibility back to us. If they do something that is stupid, they blame the people, and if an initiative is passed, I don’t believe they are compelled to act on it if I remember correctly.
