The most unelectable person in the entire race is Hillary.

The peer reviewed research suggests asking voters who they think will win is the best predictor of electoral success, ergo:

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Hillary Clinton is a 10/11 favorite at the offshore betting sites and the VT senator is a 7-1 underdog


http://www.oddschecker.com/politics/us-politics/us-presidential-election-2016/winner


If you bet on Hillary you have to put up $1,100 to win $1,000.00

If you bet on Bernie you have to put up $145.00 to win $1,000.00.



The efficacy of polls nine months out in predicting a general election winner is essentially null. I will go with peer reviewed research. I will let others go with the musings of value laden political pundits.

what you're doing is using the betting behaviour (UK spelling!) of a bunch of British bettors. I would rely on U.S. polls polling actual Americans more than the British bettors.

The peer reviewed research suggests:

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and that polls far away from an election are actually the worst predictor of electoral success:

...scholarly articles on the prediction of US presidential elections.

It should be noted that the one section that i saw referring to prediction markets referred to Iowa Electronic Markets (unless I overlooked something and I don't think so). It did not refer to such British entities as Betfair, Ladbrokes, etc., etc.

As I understand matters, Iowa Electronic Markets (which only takes very small wagers) will not truly become notably significant until after both major parties chooses their nominees.

Now, I concede that at one point in time there was a prediction market (called Intrade) that more than 3 years ago accepted wagers from Americans on US presidential elections. I definitely concede that this particular prediction market was extremely accurate. However, Intrade no longer accepts any wagers from Americans on presidential races, and may not even exist anymore (not sure). Believe me, I have tried to find a replacement for Intrade, to no avail.

Now you might wonder "Well, can't the British be good predictors of American elections too?" Well, they can, but it might be notably harder for them. I suspect that each bettor would only wager a small amount (sort of an amusement bet) rather than the very large amounts I saw on Intrade.

It would be similar to asking ourselves to wager on "What political party will win the majority of Parliament seats in the next UK election?" How would we even begin to get a sense of what shall happen? Would we wager just for amusement or instead in a deeply thought out manner?

In summary, I don't think IEM has started this early in the year, at least not in earnest, and I would not place much stock in the British prediction markets.

Last edited Mon Feb 22, 2016, 11:54 PM - Edit history (1)

All their analysis applies to voter surveys conducted within, at most, 150 days of the election, and mostly within 100 days. We're currently 260 days away, there is no evidence that their premise would be pertinent to this time frame. (Their analysis also seems to be based on situations where the nominees of both parties have already been determined, so there would be fewer variables to consider.)

It will be difficult to win a GE with that huge of a handicap. A lot of people seem to live in a Democratic "safe zone" where they can easily dismiss this alarming fact.

If the republicans nominate cruz, Hillary could win. Any of the others it would be too close to call.