Elections have been referred to as horse races, so why not bet on them? In advance of the 2008 elections in the U.S., the online magazine Slate will be tracking the results from four political prediction markets:- Iowa Electronic Markets (operated by University of Iowa College of Business faculty)
- Intrade Trading Exchange
- NewsFutures
- Casualobserver.net (Web site not yet live)
The impetus for this undertaking is the frequency with which big political prediction markets have forecast election winners, making them "consistently" more accurate than pre-election polls, according to Slate. And as in horse racing, shares in a candidate who's perceived to have little chance of winning will pay off more if he or she is indeed chosen.
2008 Political Futures (Slate)
Graphic: Snapshot of the Iowa Electronic Markets' 2008 U.S. Republican National Convention Market, between Mar. 2007 and Jan. 24, 2008. The graph shows the recent decline of Giuliani and the rise of McCain and Romney.
