[Mega Market] What will the US Congress do in 2024?
Standard
45
Ṁ7041
Jan 3
97%
Have an active member resign
95%
Pass Israel aid
94%
Pass Ukraine aid
88%
Pass more than 25 laws
85%
Pass a bill via unanimous consent
64%
Pass more than 50 laws
52%
Establish a new federal government office
50%
Have an active member die
26%
Pass a budget on time (not a continuing resolution, or an omnibus)
16%
A change in Congressional leadership
12%
Remove an existing federal government office
11%
Cause a government shutdown
10%
Declare war
5%
Throw fists on the floor while congress is in session
3%
Adjust the filibuster in any way
3%
Expel an active member
2%
Pass a new amendment

Please feel free to add new ones, but I may ask for a canonical data source for your answer. Anything added after Congress has already acted will not count, let’s keep this predictive.

This market is referring to the 118th United States Congress in their second year (session ending on Jan 3rd, 2025), and all actions that they take (or don’t take).

The term “pass” is used to denote a bill becoming a law, which requires either a presidential signature and both chambers of congress’ approvals, or a 2/3 supermajority from congress overruling a presidential veto.

Data:

Laws passed by congress

Ukraine / Israel Aid

  • These must be new bills created in 2024, and not continuation of existing aid packages (example).

Congressional Declarations of War:

  • The most recent one was: Jun 4, 1942 (Bulgaria, Hungary, and Romania).

Federal Agencies

Resignations + Deaths

  • Cannot have already announced their resignation (so not Brian Higgins or Bill Johnson).

  • Cannot be currently dead.

Government Shutdowns

  • Since 2000, there have been 3 (2013 - divided gov’t; 2018 - GOP controlled; 2018-19 - GOP controlled).

Amendments

  • The most recent amendment, the 27th, was introduced in 1789 and only ratified in 1992.

  • As amendments to the constitution can be proposed by either Congress or a national convention of the states, we will only count amendments brought forth by Congress for this market.

Filibuster changes

  • This could include anything from bringing back the talking filibuster to abolishing it altogether.

Congressional Leadership (Senate, House)

  • This would mean either the Majority / Minority Leader or Majority / Minority Whip (in either chamber), or a new Speaker of the House.

Unanimous Consent (UC) [govinfo.gov]

  • The bill must pass the House or the Senate via unanimous consent. This vote must be conducted with all (present) members of the governing body, i.e. not merely passing a subcommittee via UC.

  • A voice vote may count, if and only if, the audio is silent during the “all opposed” portion and there is mainstream reporting claiming this was unanimous.

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https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna137101 Should be good enough for the Senate

Pass Ukraine aid

Does this count if they seize frozen russian assets and send them to Ukraine? Or is it strictly new bottom line spending? I think the latter might be worth betting a small amount against, but the former seems pretty likely to happen.

@AndrewHartman Good question. If congress passes a bill sending any aid money to Ukraine, this should count. Frozen Russian assets (assuming this is cash) would definitely count. As would weapons / defense systems / food / …etc.

I think “aid” actually leaves open a semi-wide window. Now this has to come from Congress so Biden or the DoD can’t do this themselves and have that count.

Does that leave any ambiguity?

Have an active member resign

@Marnix I barely follow US politics, chatgpt told me this was rare 😆, curious if you think any active member in particular is likely to resign?

@TheBayesian two have already announced their resignations in 2024. If a third joins, this’ll be a YES

@TheBayesian NJ senator Bob Hernandez, who's currently being investigated for bribery (assuming senators count too)

@Marnix but with that said, it's also an election year - it's far more common to see resignations around now, with people trying to run for something else (or even just deciding they hate the place)

@Marnix ooo neat that makes sense

Pass a budget on time (not a continuing resolution, or an omnibus)

@TheUserU2 how does this differ from “cause a government shutdown”? If a budget isn’t passed on time, what happens?

@mattyb The US hasn't passed an actual budget via the normal (legally required, not that that matters) process since like . . . 1997? ish. They just keep passing continuing resolutions to keep the government open. Presuming the question option actually means passing a budget the correct way (and not the usual end of year all things jammed into an omnibus that nobody reads method) this should be sitting at like .5%.

@AndrewHartman sounds good. Can you update the text to say, “not a CR and not an omnibus”.

<accidentally posted twice>

@mattyb It's too late for me to edit it, but if you want to resolve it as N/A and restate the question then that should work.

@TheUserU2 turns out i had the power all along mwahaha. this way i don’t steal your trader bonuses :)

Have an active member resign

This is a good one to jump on. Multiple members have already stated their intent to resign.

@JaredHoffman Never mind. Read description.

@JaredHoffman :)

I do this on 40% of the posts I see too.

Pass a bill via unanimous consent

This needs specification. Does it need to be UC’d by both houses? Does voice vote in House count?

@JaredHoffman thanks for this. you’re right; this was way under-defined. @TheBayesian (fyi) as you bet on this one.

Adding this all to the description as well.

Unanimous Consent (UC) [govinfo.gov]

  • The bill must pass the House or the Senate via unanimous consent. This vote must be conducted with all (present) members of the governing body, i.e. not merely passing a subcommittee via UC.

  • A voice vote may count, if and only if, the audio is silent during the “all opposed” portion and there is mainstream reporting claiming this was unanimous.

You're signing up for quite a lot of resolution work here 😅

@Joshua I spent 5 days refreshing Obama’s ig basically hourly. I already follow politics really closely, this shouldn’t be too bad (until people start adding crazy things…).

@Joshua i’m waiting for 33 to add “someone sneezes 5 times” or something else insane like that.

Hahaha

@strutheo please use the sources attached for mine. This article is from 12-19 and there have been a few laws passed since then (src).

According to Congress.org, there have been 31 laws passed in the 2023 session.

This is the missing set, passed since the NYT article was written.

@mattyb Will you resolve stuff as soon as they can be resolved with certainty (say there were 26 laws passed in may)? Matters for opportunity cost

@TheBayesian yep! first person who dies, that resolves. Same for war, change of leadership, bills, fist fights…etc.

@mattyb 😬