I would love it if they put "The artist formerly known as Marvin Richardson."

Question for anyone who might venture a guess. I'm assuming the polls are going to be jam packed on election day as this is a presidential election and a pretty darn active one at that. I asked my boss if she might close our office at midday to encourage voting (other non-profits in the area are doing this) to which she replied that people can vote on their lunch breaks. Granted we have an hour for lunch, but is it really feasible to get to a polling place (say 10 minutes away), stand in line, vote and be back to work in an hour?

It seems unlikely to me but I might just be overly enthusiastic about the number of people who will be voting. BTW, I live in a suburb of NYC (Rockland County).

I feel like I posted this before but now I can't find it. Hmmm...

The other consideration is if the place where you are required to vote is even close enough to work to do on your lunch hour.

I honestly have no idea about other parts of the country, but the two states that I have most recently lived in have a required voting location that is in the part of town where you live. You can't just go anywhere to vote. Since most people that I know have at least a 20 minute commute to work, voting on lunch hour is not feasible at all.

With early voting, you can vote at any of the early voting locations. There are three in my county, and I think this also plays into why early voting turnout has been so high. All the people who work downtown can easily jaunt over and early vote at the downtown location during a lunch hour, and not have to worry about extremely long lines before or after work on election day.

Unfortunately, New York doesn't have early voting.

I will be voting on November 4th. If I got fired for voting, I would sue.

What are your work hours and what hours are your polls open? Ours are open 7 am-8 pm and anybody who is waiting in line at 8 pm gets to vote. It's not like bankers' hours for the polls. My boss is fine with us being late on election day if we have an "I voted" sticker when we get in. I will get in line at 7 am.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh! The polls are open from 6 AM - 9 PM. I will be there at 6 AM!

Here's a link (it's a PDF) to voting leave laws by state. In many states, most employees who work from 8 or 9 am until 5 pm aren't covered by voting leave laws because the polls are open long enough outside of those hours for employees to go vote.

In NY, employees who have more than 4 consecutive hours to vote outside of work hours are not covered.

Thanks Hannah. :)

For any Floridians who have not yet early voted, Gov. Crist has extended the early voting hours to 7AM-7PM. The last day to early vote is Sunday.

Ahhh...I love voting by absentee. Why don't more states do absentee? That's the only choice in Oregon, and I think the majority of voters in Washington vote by mail.

This may be silly of me, but I was wondering why they gave those out when I left early voting yesterday. It kind of seemed like a waste of money and kind of a goofy grade school sentiment (yea! be proud of me, I voted.), but I hadn't thought of them as proof for employers. (Not that it really bothered me, but it particularly struck me as odd at early voting so I thought about it more.)

It's also good PR for the political process. Peer pressure.