Electoral Votes
Electoral-vote.com is a great resource for tracking the 51 separate Presidential elections we’re going to hold this November, and what their sum might be. Right now the Votemaster splits the states into Safe Kerry, Weak Kerry, Barely Kerry, and three equivalent categories for Bush states. And he predicts 300 electoral votes for Kerry to 228 for Bush.
But there’s a problem here - in calculating that final total, he counts the Barely Kerry states the same as the Safe Kerry states. Certainly that’s how things work in November - in most states (Maine is one exception, and I think there are others), you get all the electors regardless of your margin of victory. But at the same time, Kerry’s current 22% lead in Rhode Island has more predictive value than does his 2% lead in Iowa. And despite the Votemaster’s Kerry prediction, Bush has more “safe” states than Kerry.
So if we weight the states where a candidate has a large lead such that they “count” more than the battleground states, how does the prediction change?
I downloaded the spreadsheet from the site and added a field for each candidate-state pair called Expected Electoral Vote, defined as the state’s number of electors multiplied by the candidate’s current polling percentage. If we ran that state’s election an infinite number of times, and the probability that a given candidate would win equalled his polling position on June 24, 2004, this new number would represent the average number of electors he would obtain from that state. For example, Kerry is currently polling at 35% in Alabama, which has 9 electors - his Expected Electoral Vote (henceforth EEV) total for Alabama is 35% of 9 = 3.15. Bush, at 54% in Alabama right now, can expect 4.86 electoral votes.
Totalling up EEV for every candidate in every state, it’s another squeaker. Kerry wins by three quarters of an elector, 245.2 to 244.45. Nader, the only independent running at the moment, grabs 13.58 electors. I hope the Supreme Court aren’t planning to go on vacation this fall.
Full EEV totals, based on electoral-vote.com’s June 24th data, are below.
State EV KerryEEV BushEEV NaderEEV Alabama 9 3.15 4.86 0 Alaska 3 0.84 1.77 0.3 Arizona 10 4.1 4.4 0.2 Arkansas 6 2.82 2.7 0.12 California 55 28.05 21.45 2.2 Colorado 9 3.96 4.41 0.36 Connecticut 7 3.22 2.52 0.56 Delaware 3 1.65 1.26 0.09 D.C. 3 2.67 0.27 0.15 Florida 27 12.96 11.34 0.27 Georgia 15 4.8 7.35 0.45 Hawaii 4 2.24 1.48 0.24 Idaho 4 1.12 2.68 0.08 Illinois 21 10.92 8.19 0.21 Indiana 11 3.63 5.94 0.66 Iowa 7 3.43 3.29 0.14 Kansas 6 2.34 3.42 0 Kentucky 8 3.12 4.16 0 Louisiana 9 3.78 4.32 0 Maine 4 2.16 1.4 0.12 Maryland 10 5.2 3.8 0 Massachusetts 12 6.48 3.6 0.6 Michigan 17 7.82 7.99 0.34 Minnesota 10 5 4.5 0.3 Mississippi 6 2.46 3.48 0.06 Missouri 11 5.28 5.39 0.11 Montana 3 0.99 1.59 0.18 Nebraska 5 1.65 3.1 0.2 Nevada 5 2.25 2.35 0.1 New Hampshire 4 1.84 1.72 0.08 New Jersey 15 6.9 6 1.05 New Mexico 5 2.5 2.15 0.05 New York 31 17.05 11.16 0.31 North Carolina 15 6 6.9 0.6 North Dakota 3 0.99 1.83 0.09 Ohio 20 9.8 8.6 0.4 Oklahoma 7 2.38 3.71 0 Oregon 7 3.57 3.08 0.07 Pennsylvania 21 10.29 9.03 0.42 Rhode Island 4 2.12 1.24 0 South Carolina 8 3.12 3.92 0.24 South Dakota 3 1.05 1.53 0.12 Tennessee 11 4.29 6.27 0.11 Texas 34 12.92 19.72 1.02 Utah 5 1.1 3.35 0.15 Vermont 3 1.53 1.08 0.12 Virginia 13 5.85 6.11 0.39 Washington 11 5.72 4.95 0.11 West Virginia 5 2.15 2.45 0.05 Wisconsin 10 5.1 4.6 0.1 Wyoming 3 0.84 2.04 0.06 Totals 538 245.2 244.45 13.58