Election Prediction Using Earthquake Model

A Washington Post article reports of a collaboration between a Soviet geophysicist and an American historian that resulted in a political theory about earthquakes and election results. Keilis-Borok and Lichtman analyzed every presidential election between 1860 and 1980 looking to see such factors as whether the incumbent party in the White House lost or lost seats in the previous midterm election and whether the incumbent party had achieved a monumental policy victory.

Instead of looking at policies, they looked at elections as stability vs upheaval (like earthquakes). Stability, according to their definition is when the party is incumbent in the White House - so this year it is the Republican Party - wins the next presidential election. Upheavals are when the opposition party wins the White House presidential election.

They found that four markers helped correctly predict the election results for every Presidential election for the past 120 years: Did the incumbents party's candidate win the nomination on the first ballot with at least two thirds of the delegate count, the absence of a third party candidate who won 5% or more of the overall vote, the absence of a recession and the presence of a major policy victory in the previous term.

The interesting thing about this predictive model is that it can predict the outcome of the election even before the campaigning begins. In 2000, they predicted Gore, in 2004 they predicted Bush. And in 2008 they are predicting Obama.

This does not mean that you should stay home - no matter which way you vote - get out and vote.