Elections are always stressful on people. Even if it's not a big election, they may still feel stressed out for having to go to their precinct and vote, or fill out their absentee. Many of us know what it's like to be a voter, and hopefully one day everyone will, but few know what it's like to work the elections.
I've been working at elections for about a year now. And I feel like not everyone understands the stress an election worker must go through. Not all the stress is bad per say, but stressful nonetheless.
The chairperson has the most stressful job. Their in charge of the precinct, and if anything goes wrong, it ultimately falls on them. They have to continually help with problems, and deal with any troublesome people.
The next most stressful job is computers. This is where I work. We computer people are in charge of scan voter’s driver's license, or looking them up if they don't have one with them. We make sure they get issued a ballot number (which is important for counting). If we do something wrong, everything is wrong. If the numbers on our computer do not match the number on the tabulator, than chaos breaks out. But it's not all bad. You get to be a part of something great. And as long as the voters are happy, it's a pretty good day.
The other job is the actual issuing of the ballots. They are the ones that make sure the ballot numbers are correct when handing them to the voter. This is the most likeable job in my opinion.
The hardest part about working elections is when a problem does occur. We as workers start stressing out because a lot depends on us, and when voters are unhappy than that makes our job ten times harder.
Working elections are not always so stressful. The primary and presidential are the more stressful ones for obvious reasons, they're the most busiest. The lesser elections, for school bonds and such, are much more relaxing. Whenever there is no one in the precinct workers are allowed to do whatever, read, do homework, walk around the room to stretch (sitting in a chair for 12 hours gets uncomfortable fairly quickly), sometimes we even play games to pass the time. There's no time for any of that in a presidential election.
One benefit to working elections is the fact that they provide us with lunch and dinner. So, although we have to be there from 6am-9pm, at least we get fed, oh and paid. I don't know if all election workers get paid, but my home city pays ours. It's not much, just enough to make it worth it, besides being apart of something great, that is.
