Other models include the equivalent of that sea salt or coconut sugar, taking into account factors like incumbency and the economy — sometimes called the fundamentals. This can get tricky, as you might imagine. Typically, being an incumbent is considered an asset in an election, but what happens when the incumbent is unpopular and globally we are seeing incumbent politicians being ousted left and right? (This is to say nothing of the unique strangeness of this presidential election, in which whether the sitting vice president should be considered an incumbent is a point of debate among pollsters and forecasters.)
Or take the economy. Unemployment is rising slightly, inflation is cooling off, and the Fed is considering cutting interest rates. Which is the best indicator of how the economy may affect the election? The site 538 uses 11 economic indicators in its model. Meanwhile, 62% of voters in a recent poll said they thought the economy was bad.
Ultimately, voters will cast their ballots, and a new president will be elected, regardless of what a forecast says. So why bother? In short, a forecast gives a window into how a campaign might assess the race and make choices about which strategy to deploy. A campaign that is losing ground may need to make some major adjustments to get back on track, or a campaign that is surging may begin taking fewer risks so as not to squander its newfound advantage. Knowing who is up and who is down can help news consumers better understand why candidates and campaigns make the decisions they do.
Just as different pollsters use different methods to measure public opinion, the forecasters who use those poll results to make predictions are also using different ingredients to build their models. The solution for you, the savvy news consumer? Consume a wide variety. There’s no such thing as too many chocolate chip cookies — I mean, election models.
Kristen Soltis Anderson is a contributing Opinion writer for the New York Times, a Republican pollster, a speaker and a commentator. She is also the author of “The Selfie Vote: Where Millennials Are Leading America (and How Republicans Can Keep Up).”
