This illustrates...something

Off Phoenician in a Time of Romans' comment here that there are 18 political parties in New Zealand*, I did a little math and realized that, per capita, New Zealand has nearly three times as many political parties as we have representatives.

Update: After I posted, I identified the late-night logic hole I'd fallen into. We have lots of political parties, too! What about the Constitution Party, the Greens, AIG? Since only seven of the NZ parties have members of parliament, it's much fairer to say that, per capita, New Zealand just has a slightly higher number of relevant political parties than we have representatives. That's ever so much less disturbing.

* Plus one that apparently consists entirely of Archie Bunker.