I don't know if this has any special significance, but I think the number of FB/Twitter followers for the current frontrunners are interesting. I'll use Facebook numbers.<p>Hillary Clinton - 1.3 million<p>Jeb Bush - .26 million<p>Donald Trump - 3.7 million<p>Joe Biden - .85 million<p>Bernie Sanders - 1.4 million<p>Marco Rubio - .99 million<p>John Kasich - .14 million<p>Scott Walker - .36 million<p>Ben Carson - 2.88 million<p>No, I don't think that Donald Trump is the runaway favorite for president. On the other hand, a look at these would make Walker's collapse and Bush's struggles (despite a goliath $100 million warchest) less of a surprise than the political press has portrayed. Likewise, Sanders' challenge to Clinton would be less surprising.<p>Bush is the real surprise to me. Endorsements and dollars show that he's the establishment's pick, but people just aren't interested in the guy. It would be kind of amazing if someone went from having a D-list celebrity following to sitting in the oval office in a little over a year.
I worked for a summer at Intrade.com during 2008.<p>It was a very flawed company (and CEO) but it's a pity it's not around during this election. US Presidential elections were one of the few things were it had enough data and people putting money on it's markets that it's predictions were excellent. (Though I think in hindsight I got the job by telling John Delaney the immediate market highs for the Republican's post-Palin entry was a temporary bounce and Obama would win because the economy was the main issue, the Democrats were polling far far higher on it - guess a political degree can sometimes trump market sentiment :)<p>In fact, I think it's a pity (with the exception of how badly the company was run) in general that something like Intrade is not around. If I am legally allowed to speculate/gamble on oil futures, I really don't understand why I can't be allowed to speculate/gamble/hedge on geopolitical events.
Why in the world would they bet on Jeb Bush over Trump or Carson? Look at the actual polls, Bush is doing worse and worse, while Trump and Carson are rising:<p><a href="http://i.imgur.com/naxgnhi.png" rel="nofollow">http://i.imgur.com/naxgnhi.png</a><p><a href="http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/page/national/rise-of-the-anti-establishment-presidential-candidates/1822/" rel="nofollow">http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/page/national/rise-of-the-a...</a><p>(yesterday's numbers)
Interestingly, with Joe Biden in the range (10%, 13.5%) to win the nomination, and (7.7%, 8.3%) to win the Presidency, the lowest his electability could be is<p><pre><code> 7.7% / 13.5% = 57%
</code></pre>
and the highest it could be is<p><pre><code> 8.3% / 10.0% = 83%
</code></pre>
so the market seems to be pricing a probability in the range of (57%, 83%) for Biden to be elected president if he won the nomination - compared to Hillary Clinton's range of (56.9%, 57.7%)<p>I can think of a few explanations -<p>1. Biden really is a lot more electable than Hillary Clinton<p>2. Both candidates have electability at the low end of their range (around 57%).<p>3. The market is wrong, i.e. they are systematically underrating Biden's chance of winning the nomination (and overrating Clinton's) or overrating Biden's chance of winning the election (and underrating Clinton's) or both.<p>There is no arbitrage, but if you believe 3, there might be a good profit to be made <i>in expectation</i> by backing Biden to win the election, but Clinton to win the presidency (you wouldn't hold it through to 2016, but take off the bet as soon as the odds come back to something that looks more plausible).<p>I haven't done the analysis to see if it's still worth it after trading costs, but maybe someone else wants to.
This same math can be applied to the MLB World Series. (I'm in Toronto, which means for the first time since the early 90s, baseball is interesting!)<p>Instead of primaries, there's Pennants. Instead of general elections, there's the World Series.<p><a href="http://www.vegasinsider.com/mlb/odds/futures/" rel="nofollow">http://www.vegasinsider.com/mlb/odds/futures/</a><p>Right now, the Jays are the second most likely team to win their Pennant (2/1 vs 9/5 for the Royals). But at the same time, they are the <i>most</i> likely to win the World Series (17/4 vs 9/2 for the Royals). In terms of the original article, the Jays are more 'electable' than the Royals.<p>I have no idea how this should affect betting strategies, but it sure is interesting from a statistics point of view.
I wonder when if ever it will be cost effective for a candidate to put many bets in order to manipulate the odds. Idea being when you have reported 75% winning lots of people who would vote against you stay home "cause it's pointless".
I'd be curious to see Electability numbers given scenarious of one candidate v another. For instance, 'Clinton v Bush', 'Sanders v Trump'.
I don't think people understand how close presidential elections are in the US (even after the nightmare in Florida with the supreme court picking Bush as the winner).<p>The idea of Trump picking the next few supreme court judges is nauseating.