I don't like change. But I guess it has merit. (An answer downvotes graph would help to judge it better..) Usually I avoid downvoting newcomer questions. It's pointless to downvote a rep 1 user. And if it costs me -1 without affecting that account, I do in fact opt out. (But most people use closevotes in lieu of downvotes in these cases anyway.) So making that free would indeed incentivize me to downvote more questions. But I believe I'm already downvoting too few answers. And if this idea is given a roll, I would request that this is used to at least even out the discrepancy between question and answer votes: cost upvote cost downvote question 0 +5 0 -1 answer 0 +10 -1 -2 If upvotes only bring half as much reputation win, then downvotes should subtract only half of what answer downvotes do.