Yet another reason to vote by mail. Nobody should ever have to "wait in line" to vote, especially not given current events.
The article is astonishingly ignorant about how the process actually works. 1) Local election boards establish how many polling places, their location, the hours, who works there, and myriad other critical details about the election. 2) The local election boards are comprised of people who are..wait for it..local. And, 3) thanks to whichever party is in power at the state level, the districts are drawn in such a way that almost all of the districts have a nice buffer of people/voters who are likeminded.
All of these together generally mean that it's just shitty local election boards and committees, mostly volunteers, who are so inept they don't even understand how many power cords should be around or to have the key to the machines so they can be turned on, etc etc etc.
It's tragic, and it's sad. What it isn't is some mustache twirling shadowy Monopoly man-type figure working day and night to keep poor people from voting. It's just basic organization at the very local level..
In states with early voting, it makes no sense to wait in line. Just come back another day. In many states, early voting extends until Oct 30. Even the last vote cast on Oct 30 is still an early vote. Why are people waiting in line for hours? People seem to think this is a "justice" issue...as if somehow waiting in line for hours imbues your vote with so much virtue that it becomes tamper proof.
The study: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1909.00024.pdf
Yes, they control for poverty.