When will the U.S. elect its first female President?
Standard
42
แน€3175
2049
48%
2024
16%
2028
12%
2032
11%
2036
3%
2040
2%
2044
1.8%
2048
7%
Not before 2052

This market resolves to the first election year in which a woman wins the presidential election in the U.S.

Note that in the event of a delayed election - e.g. the 2028 election being pushed to early 2029 instead - then the election still counts as being in the year it was originally scheduled for.

Any presidential candidate who openly and sincerely identifies as a woman counts for the purposes of this question. Nonbinary candidates would not count unless they actively referred to themselves as a woman in addition to being nonbinary.

(UPDATE:) In the event that a party's presidential nominee (as selected at the party convention) is not a woman, but the vice-presidential nominee is, and the party's presidential nominee dies or drops out of the race prior to September 15 of election year, then this market resolves YES for the year in question if the party's candidate (the ex-VP-candidate) wins the election.

If the presidential election of 2048 is over, and a woman has not been elected President, this market resolves to "Not before 2052" on the assumption that the next presidential election will happen on schedule.

If the U.S. dissolves entirely at any point between market creation and November 1, 2048, this market resolves as "Not before 2052." It also resolves as "Not before 2052" if the U.S. absolishes the presidency (e.g. in favor of a parliamentary system) and has not re-established the position as of 2049.

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If the vice president is a woman and then becomes the president via the 25th amendment, but then is not elected to another term of presidency, then she never would have been elected president, correct? Similar to Gerald Ford. Iโ€™m mostly poking for fun, but strictly speaking, this market spoiled resolve to โ€œNeverโ€ if she was never elected before dying.

Does this market refer to someone's public identity at the time of election? Because otherwise things could get real funky with presidents announcing they are/aren't women after they've been elected, or more likely years or decades after they've served their term.

@dph121 I think the most straightforward interpretation of "a woman wins the presidential election," is that they publicly identify as a woman at the time of the election. Especially since this market will be resolved as soon as a woman is in fact elected.

"Not before 2052" should be much higher as there's a pretty high probability (I'd say at least 40%) that the presidency no longer exists by 2048 because of superintelligence changing the world into being unrecognizable.

Here are my rough probabilities of the presidency still existing by some point: 2024: 97% 28: 85% 32: 60% 36: 50% 40: 40% 44: 35% 48: 30%.


So, when I condition the current market probabilities on the presidency still existing by some point, I get:

  • By 2024: 4.85%

  • By 2028: 18.7%

  • By 2032: 13.8%

  • By 2036: 11.5%

  • By 2040: 3.6%

  • By 2044: 2.1%

  • By 2048: 1.5%

  • Not before 2050: 43.95%

@Nikola I suppose if you really believe those probabilities, you should bet "Not by 2050" up, then. I think those probabilities for the presidency still existing are insanely low, though. I made a market about it if you want to bet based on your own probability assessments:

I forgot to notify traders when I updated the description, so here's the relevant section for y'all:

(UPDATE:) In the event that a party's presidential nominee (as selected at the party convention) is not a woman, but the vice-presidential nominee is, and the party's presidential nominee dies or drops out of the race prior to September 15 of election year, then this market resolves YES for the year in question if the party's candidate (the ex-VP-candidate) wins the election.

Okay, here's my thought process for the Biden/Harris scenario (or any future scenario like it.)

If a Presidential nominee who is not a woman dies or drops out of the election before early voting for the general election in has started in at least three states, and their nominee for vice president is a woman and is effectively the next Presidential nominee of the party, then this market resolves as YES for the year in question if they are elected President. This market also resolves as YES for a year if the Presidential nominee dies or drops out long enough before the election that at least 99% of ballots list the new, female ex-Vice Presidential nominee as the party's official Presidential nominee.


If a Presidential nominee who is not a woman dies or drops out of the election after early voting has begun in at least three states, and their nominee for vice president is a woman (regardless of if she is effectively the next Presidential nominee of the party or not), that is not sufficient for this market to resolve as YES for the year in question. In addition, if, in a collection of states containing the majority of the U.S. population, the name on the ballot is still the name of the dead/no-longer-running Presidential nominee, this market does not resolve as YES for the year in question.

Under these criteria, the market resolves as YES for 2024 if:

  • Joe Biden is selected as the Democratic nominee at the DNC in 2024

  • AND Biden dies or drops out before mid-September (at which points ballots have been finalized - IDK about other states, but Colorado finalizes ballots in the first week of September - and it's the point at which early voting is about to begin in a few states)

  • AND Kamala Harris (or, considerably less likely, another woman) is selected as the next Presidential nominee

  • AND ballots in at least half of the U.S. (by population) display Kamala Harris/another woman as the Democratic nominee

  • AND votes for "Joe Biden" in any states that have not changed their ballots are counted as votes for Kamala Harris/another woman by media reporting agencies - e.g. if "Joe Biden" wins Illinois because it has a long early voting period & less time to update its ballots as a result, then the AP, NYT, Politico, etc. should count its votes as votes for Harris/another woman in tallies of the Electoral College and popular vote

This all applies to if the Republican nominee is not a woman and the VP candidate is - e.g. if Trump dies or drops out in October with Kari Lake as his VP, but Republicans win the election, then it doesn't count because of all the early votes that were cast for Trump, as well as Trump's name still being on the ballot.

Basically, this resolves as YES for 2024 if:

  • Both major parties* nominate a woman as their presidential candidate, and neither dies or drops out before the election**

  • A major party nominates a woman as its presidential candidate, and she does not die or drop out before the election, and she wins the election

  • A major party nominates a woman as its presidential candidate, and she dies or drops out before the election, but her VP candidate is also a woman, and she wins the election

  • A major party nominates a woman as its presidential candidate, and she dies or drops out after early voting for the general election has begun in at least three states, and her name appears on a majority of printed ballots in the election, and regardless of the gender of her VP candidate, her party's candidate wins the presidential election

  • A major party nominates someone other than a woman as its presidential candidate, and they nominate a woman as the VP candidate, and the presidential nominee dies or drops out before early voting for the general election has begun in at least three states, and the VP candidate's name appears on a majority of printed ballots in the election, and she wins the election

*(Note that here, "major party" can refer to a party other than Democrats or Republicans in the exceedingly unlikely scenario that a "third party" is polling well enough that they have a genuine shot at winning the election.)

**(If this happens, the market resolves YES upon polls closing in a majority of states on Election Night, since at that point a woman being elected president is guaranteed.)

Fun fact: I was in a high-ranking position in my university's Poli Sci club in undergrad, and I rewrote the club's constitution for fun. Thinking of weird technicalities just to defuse them makes my specific brand of autism go brrrrrrr

TL;DR Please read the section in block quotes - it's what I plan on adding to the description of the market. If you see any glaring loopholes, or have criticism about the timing, etc. - please let me know. I had to place a cutoff date somewhere - most people would probably agree that if Biden is nominated at the DNC and dies the day afterwards with Harris taking his place, she won the election; but would also agree that if Biden died six hours before polls closed on Election Night, then it's really him who won and not Harris. So there's a point in between where the winner switches from Harris to Biden. I'd be willing to move the metric for when, if people think that's reasonable - is it after 50% of all ballots are finalized with Biden's name on them? After 10% of early votes are cast? I like my current how-many-states one, since it's easy to resolve.

(And this is why this wasn't originally in the criteria. Lots and lots of typing.)

@evergreenemily This seems overcomplicated, especially given that it's unlikely to matter anyway. Why not just use a cutoff date? That would be easier to understand and easier to verify if the criteria had actually been met.

@JosephNoonan Yeah, I probably should simplify. Maybe a semi-arbitrary date of September 15? Should capture "ballots starting to be finalized, early vote starting to be available" pretty well.

@evergreenemily wow, lots of words. I apologize for my part in precipitating this work ๐Ÿ˜…

In the block quoted section, I see both "99% of ballots" and "states containing the majority of the U.S. population"; from the additional discussion/examples, it looks like the latter is the intended criterion?

In the block quoted section, I think the second paragraph is just confirming that failing to meet conditions described in the first paragraph doesn't cause any particular resolution, is that right? If so, it might be clearer to leave the second paragraph out; I reread it several times to try to figure out if it was adding new conditions. It hopefully should be obvious that if the world hasn't met conditions for YES, that's not sufficient to resolve YES.

Wording nit: I think "before early voting for the general election in has started in at least three states" would be more clear as "when early voting for the general election has started in fewer than three states". (Consider a date when early voting has started in exactly 25 states. Then in at least three states, it's before early voting has started!)

Overall, "(prez candidate dies when fewer than 3 states have started early voting) OR (vp candidate promoted to prez candidate on ballots covering 50% of population)" seems like a reasonable approach to me. I think a simpler approach could be fine too, such as one of those conditions individually or a simple cutoff date.

@jcb No worries! I find this sort of stuff fun - I wouldn't be doing it otherwise.

I think that wording tweak is definitely a good one. Figuring out how to word things definitely isn't my strong suit in writing - I think it's part of why I like writing overly detailed resolution criteria. It's like a challenge to make sure I don't get misinterpreted.

I ended up going with a simple cutoff date, but forgot to post a comment notifying traders about it. I'm gonna do that really quickly, to make sure people know.

Oop yes I didn't see the description had been updated so I thought this thread was still open haha. ๐Ÿ‘

How will you treat cases like a Biden/Harris ticket and Biden dies shortly before the election?

@jcb She would not have been elected president.

@jcb Good question. I'd resolve based on the name written on the ballots, I think - but it's hard to say, since presumably almost everyone in America would know that voting for the now-deceased Joe Biden would lead to a Harris presidency.

I'd say resolves YES for 2024 if Biden dies before Labor Day, otherwise resolves NO for 2024. Somewhat arbitrary, but I think the chance of Biden dying next year is very low (~5%.)

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