The rule for fair agency budgets developed from a more majoritarian system which its inventors, Annund Hylland and Richard Zeckhauser, called Influence Points, IP . Here is a simple version using chips for influence points. Their balloons and weights are symbolized by chips . This particular table forms a bar chart, and each agency has a column where reps may lay chips. A flag marks an agency's initial funding which is set by last year's budget.
Reps put balloons above an item's flag to raise it, and weights below to lower it.
The item's budget at any time is half way between the highest balloon and the lowest weight. Reps move chips repeatedly to cause or counter budget changes. A rep's chips might total 100 units in area . Or a rep might move 4 budgets with 4 chips, each 5 by 5 square. A rep may use any combination of square chips that adds up to an area of 100.