Ray Fair has one of the best presidential election prediction records of anyone around, and he's an economics professor at Yale University. His only big miss since he started predicting in 1978, was the 1992 election, when he missed Bill Clinton's win by 5.1%. He predicted the 2000 election would be razor-thin, and he overestimated President Bush's winning margin in 2004 by 3.4%. All of his other predictions have been much more accurate, with a standard error of 2.54%. His latest prediction for 2008 is that the Republican will get only 47.8% of the popular vote, implying the Democratic candidate will win. Of course, the Electoral College vote, not the popular vote, is what will actually determine who wins.
His equation is a simple function of real per capita GDP, inflation, and dummy variables for which party controls the White House, and whether the incumbent president is running for reelection. His web site documents his predictions and how little his estimating methodology has changed over time.
This is economics at its best: simple, straightforward, based upon well documented data and methodology, and with useful predictions that have stood the test of time.
Did you read the same web
Did you read the same web site I did?
In October 2004 the model predicted a Bush victory by 15 points.
http://fairmodel.econ.yale.edu/vote2004/vot1004.htm
In 1996 his equation was predicting a dead heat, while the result was decisive Clinton victory. http://fairmodel.econ.yale.edu/vote2008/vote.htm
His predictions only look good when adjustments to the model are applied retroactively.
Ray Fair's Presidential Election Predictions
The Fair Doctrine
He taught his daughter well as well: Fix the model when it doesn't work.
"All of his other
"All of his other predictions have been much more accurate, with a standard error of 2.54%. "
Um, this is called 'trimming the data'. If my worse mistakes aren't counted, I'm pretty good, as well.
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