This year, King County has switched over to conducting all of its voting by mail — and we’re better off for it.

Let’s face it. Today, time is something we covet. Between school, work and personal obligations, spending 20 minutes to stop by a polling station ­— assuming you can even find one — just so you can wait in line to vote doesn’t fit into our schedule — and it’s reflective in our voting. During the 2007 election in both King County and Pierce County, more than four times as many votes were received through mail than at polling stations.

Being able to vote by mail is significantly more convenient than voting at a polling station. We no longer have to schedule voting into our busy days because mail-in ballots allow us to vote from our homes, using any extra time we may have.

As young adults, mail-in ballots make it easier for us to vote, despite our rapidly paced lives. Mail-in ballots also provide an easier means to vote for the elderly and disabled. Whether young or old, mail-in voting allows a significantly higher number of people to participate.

Consider that in 2006, Washington and Oregon — another state that is all mail-in voting — had a 65 percent and 71 percent voter turnout, respectively. Those numbers don’t sound so high on its own, but when compared to other parts of the country where mail-in voting is limited, such as Washington, D.C., (31 percent) and Kentucky (50 percent), the difference in participation is remarkable.

Furthermore, mail-in ballots make it easier to research the people and issues you are going to be voting on.

Imagine this situation: You walk into a voting booth and see two names side by side, and you have to choose one. The problem? You haven’t read up on either candidate; all you know about either is what you have seen on television. Unfortunately, this dilemma was a common occurrence that led to uninformed voting. Now, it’s no longer an issue.

Being able to vote from home helps to remedy any lack of knowledge a voter might have. You no longer feel pressured to race through your ballot by the person in line behind you. Mail-in ballots arrive much earlier than they are due, giving you plenty of time to look up the issue or candidate on the Internet or in a voters’ guide. Mail-in ballots don’t just lead to more votes, but more informed voters.

Of course, for all the wonders of mail-in ballots, some claim that they have the potential to lead to significant voter fraud. That simply isn’t the case.

There has never been a single substantiated claim of voting coercion in Washington state, and the registry of voters is scanned daily for duplicate registrations.

Even in the unlikely case of coercion, the significant increase in overall voters makes the change a net positive. For every one case of coercion, there would be hundreds of additional, legitimate, better informed votes.

Mail-in voting is the direction this country should be moving in. King County’s change simultaneously increases the ability of its residents to vote, while decreasing annual expenditure on the voting process — a change every county in the country could benefit from. Hopefully, King County’s decision — and its resulting success — will be the one that causes other counties to follow.

Reach contributing columnist Gavin Verhey at opinion@dailyuw.com.