2007-04-08

Biggest individual vote shares

I was waiting for someone to do this so I wouldn't have to do the math, but since I haven't seen it anywhere, here goes. Many sources have carried a list of parliamentary election candidates who got the biggest vote totals: 1. Niinistö, 2. Vanhanen, 3. Soini... Not coincidentally, all three are from the Uusimaa electoral district, the biggest in the country. But let's see who got the biggest individual vote shares:

#. CANDIDATE (PARTY) VOTE_TOTAL ELECTORAL_DISTRICT VOTE_SHARE
1. Niinistö, Sauli (National Coalition Party) 60'563 Uusimaa 13.0%
2. Lahtela, Esa (Social Democratic Party) 10'813 Pohjois-Karjala 12.6%
3. Väyrynen, Paavo (Centre Party) 10'944 Lappi 11.2%
4. Cronberg, Tarja (Green League) 7'804 Pohjois-Karjala 9.10%
5. Katainen, Jyrki (Coalition) 10'806 Pohjois-Savo 8.45%
6. Viitamies, Pauliina (Soc Dem) 6'690 Etelä-Savo 8.06%
7. Tennilä, Esko-Juhani (Left Alliance) 7'739 Lappi 7.94%
8. Vehviläinen, Anu (Centre) 6'789 Pohjois-Karjala 7.92%
9. Mustajärvi, Markus (Left) 7'675 Lappi 7.88%
10. Lehtomäki, Paula (Centre) 16'390 Oulu 7.12%

At first look Niinistö's accomplishment doesn't seem so phenomenal in this comparison, with Lahtela and - dispiritingly - Väyrynen breathing down his neck. But when you look at what election districts the other candidates hail from, the small gap starts to look bigger. Niinistö is the only candidate on the list from the five biggest electoral districts. Lehtomäki, who's from the sixth biggest electoral district, has the second best vote total in the top ten and she's tenth. Lappi, Pohjois-Karjala, and Etelä-Savo, the three smallest districts, fill seven of the ten spots. It makes sense that getting a big share of the vote is easier in small districts, as they have less candidates competing for the same 100 percent share.

Also, of course in terms of MPs, a big vote share in a big electoral district is worth more than the same percentage of votes in a smaller district.

Bubbling under with more than 10'000 votes and 5% of the total votes were:

Tiura, Marja (Coalition) 17'578 Pirkanmaa 6.92%
Kiljunen, Anneli (Soc Dem) 10'770 Kymi 6.42%
Mieto, Juha (Centre) 13'768 Vaasa 5.66%
Zyskowicz, Ben (Coalition) 17'607 Helsinki 5.53%
Vanhanen, Matti (Centre) 24'112 Uusimaa 5.16%

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