Seth, Pay Up

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Thu Dec 14 09:39:41 PST 2000


Nathan Newman wrote:


>From: "Doug Henwood" <dhenwood at panix.com>
>
>
>Nathan Newman wrote:
>
>>So, for the rest of LBO folks who so confidently predicted a Gore win given
>>the economy et al, how do you explain the closeness of the race in the end?
>
>-Decline of party? Gore's distancing himself from Clinton? His dismal
>-personality and campaign? It was really quite an achievement to lose
>-that election - one for the record books, in fact.
>
>Yes, but why couldn't you factor that into your model?

Because the whole point of the predictability literature is that campaigns don't really matter much - that in almost all instances, the electoral outcome is entirely predictable half a year in advance. Either this election is just one of the anomalous exceptions, or the relation is breaking down. There's something called Goodheart's Law in economics - that once a variable is incorporated into policymaking, it loses its explanatory power.

Doug



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