It seems many of us try to avoid jury duty anyway possible. Unfortunately, not voting is a bad way to go, depending upon your state. Many states look at driver's license records to select jurors.
One of the main reason people commonly try to get out of jury duty: the low pay. Some states only pay $15/day, not including your mileage. Also, your place of employment may or may not pay you for the time you're missing from the job. I've been on both sides of that coin personally.
Jurors are definitely underpaid and outside of tax purposes, there really isn't a lot of good reasons for this. Especially when you have judges, baliffs, lawyers, and such making lots of money during a trial. Jurors are important to the judical system, but aren't given the thanks they deserve.
Jurors could have skipped out or make hundreds of excuses. However many of them suck it up and take that low pay to do their civic duty. It makes no sense to pay people as much per day as people make per hour to register voters in an election year.
One solution would be to pay everyone minimum wage, plus a stipend per case you're chosen to be part of. That stipend could vary according to that person. However, I believe many states, even the poorer ones, could afford to place this in their budgets.
I'm not sure if you must have a high school education to be a juror in every state but that should also be a requirement. Also, you must have had gainful, taxable employment for six months. These are some of the things that could warrant paying jurors more.
Another thing you may have to cut out on is the amount of mileage paid. This would balance the overall scales.
Any other suggestions to pay people more for doing jury duty? This is a problem that needs addressing.
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