The real crux of the issue is that people vote mainly for signaling value. For nearly all people, the primary motivation for their political beliefs is to signal status, respectability, and/or adherence to the groups they identify with. (The latter can mean adherence to some particular faction, sect, ideology, ethnic group, etc., but also to the whole country and its abstract ideals in general.) Accordingly, the motivation for voting is to enable a symbolic expression of such beliefs that reinforces and signals them, much like a religious ritual.
So, to answer your question realistically: if the reward in good feelings and (perhaps) status signaling among some group of people you care about is high enough to justify the effort, then it is rational for you to vote. In contrast, the attempts to demonstrate that one should vote because of some deep moral principles or probabilistic considerations are pure rationalization.
I think you are right that good feelings and status are a big part of it. Why do people endure all manor of inconvenience to be a part of any big event, a movie opening or concert or rally? A lot of bragging rights to have been a part of something, rather than just watched it on TV.
Still I wonder if that is the whole explanation. The system needs X% of voters out there to be viable, but it has no real carrot to attract people to vote. So then voters just assign a value to voting, and show up in relatively large numbers on their own. And it all works out? It’s a very clever arrangement if that’s how it works.
The real crux of the issue is that people vote mainly for signaling value. For nearly all people, the primary motivation for their political beliefs is to signal status, respectability, and/or adherence to the groups they identify with. (The latter can mean adherence to some particular faction, sect, ideology, ethnic group, etc., but also to the whole country and its abstract ideals in general.) Accordingly, the motivation for voting is to enable a symbolic expression of such beliefs that reinforces and signals them, much like a religious ritual.
So, to answer your question realistically: if the reward in good feelings and (perhaps) status signaling among some group of people you care about is high enough to justify the effort, then it is rational for you to vote. In contrast, the attempts to demonstrate that one should vote because of some deep moral principles or probabilistic considerations are pure rationalization.
I think you are right that good feelings and status are a big part of it. Why do people endure all manor of inconvenience to be a part of any big event, a movie opening or concert or rally? A lot of bragging rights to have been a part of something, rather than just watched it on TV.
Still I wonder if that is the whole explanation. The system needs X% of voters out there to be viable, but it has no real carrot to attract people to vote. So then voters just assign a value to voting, and show up in relatively large numbers on their own. And it all works out? It’s a very clever arrangement if that’s how it works.