Get your news from a source that’s not owned and controlled by oligarchs. Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily.

On Sunday I noted that Ray Fair had released a projection of Obama’s odds of winning reelection in 2012. His conclusion: Obama should win in a landslide. However, this depends not just on Fair’s model being accurate, but on his rosy forecast of economic recovery being accurate too. Brendan Nyhan isn’t quite so optimistic:

The Philadelphia Fed survey of professional forecasters revised its forecast of 2012 growth downward last week from 3.6% to 2.9% (somewhat lower than the Blue Chip 3.2% figure or CBO’s 3.4%). If we plug that value into Alan Abramowitz’s simple linear fit of second-quarter GDP in election years and presidential election performance, we find Obama right around where President Bush was in 2004.

The regression on the right is not the entire Abramowitz model and doesn’t take into account the advantage of being an incumbent running for reelection. That’s dealt with in his full model and adds a couple of points to the forecast for a four-year incumbent. For that reason, this chart almost certainly underestimates Obama’s odds of winning in 2012. However, as Brendan points out, there’s also a lot of uncertainty around that growth forecast of 2.9%. If the economy ends up at the low end of projections in early 2012, Obama will be in a precarious position. Still likely to win, I think, unless we slip back into a full-blown recession, but it might be a close run thing.

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate