The expected return on your time from voting in elections is very low, unless your vote directly causes many other people to vote\. Most elections are not settled by one vote, and your one vote is very unlikely to change that\. In the Ultimatum Game, the experimenter sets up a one\-shot, two\-player scenario for dividing \$1\. One player, the Proposer, proposes how to split the \$10 with the other player, the Responder\. If the Responder accepts the proposed split, it goes through\. Otherwise both players get nothing\. A rational Proposer should offer \$1 to the other player and keep the remaining \$9; a rational Responder should accept this bargain\. \(Assuming that it's a one\-time deal, maybe anonymous so that there's no reputation effects, etcetera\.\) You and your enemy share a terrible secret\. Your enemy sets up an automatic mechanism so that unless your Bitcoin address pays 10 Bitcoins to a certain other address, a secret will be published, greatly harming you and your enemy\. In this case, paying your enemy the 10 Bitcoins has higher expected utility than not paying, and that is what a rational agent will do\.
$10