In November, I bet an anonymous EconLog reader:
If Donald Trump resigns, is removed by the Senate after impeachment, or otherwise is permanently removed as per the the 25th Amendment, or if it never happens that he takes the Oath of office as POTUS on Jan 20, 2017, the BC owes [redacted] $350. Otherwise, [redacted] owes BC $100″.
When re-reading the bet, however, I realized that I omitted a key understanding of the bet. After consulting with my partner, we’ve amended the terms to reflect our original intent. It now reads:
If Donald Trump dies in office, resigns, is removed by the Senate after impeachment, or otherwise is permanently removed as per the the 25th Amendment, or if it never happens that he takes the Oath of office as POTUS on Jan 20, 2017, the BC owes [redacted] $350. Otherwise, [redacted] owes BC $100″.
Note that this revision is entirely adverse to my interests. In fact, as I said before, I think Trump’s death is my most probable losing scenario.
READER COMMENTS
eMarkM
Feb 27 2017 at 1:20pm
Since the election I have taken Bryan’s advice when getting into political arguments and I try to steer the disagreement I have as some kind of measurable bet. It’s really great advice and helps to sharpen the focus of your prognostications.
The Trump-won’t-finish-his-term bet is a popular one and I’ve taken the same side as BC with a couple of people. Though I managed to get them to take the bet at even money. I’m sure I could generate more action if I gave better odds.
I think it’s taking advantage of a cognitive dissonance with a lot on the left and #NeverTrumpsters that they still can’t accept that he actually won and they’ll have to put up with him for the next four years. It’s still just not computing with them. So they concoct these unlikely scenarios where he somehow doesn’t complete his term and they won’t have to put up with dealing with the fact he’s POTUS.
I also agree most likely way to lose is for him to die in office of some kind of age related aliment. Second best is if Dems take Senate in ’18 and start impeachment proceedings.
Jeremy
Feb 28 2017 at 8:21am
Professor Caplan,
When you write here:
Do you mean Jan 20, 2021? Because he already took the Oath of office this year, so you would have already lost the bet.
Ally
Feb 28 2017 at 10:16am
Jeremy,
I think you’ve misread the bet.
The anonymous reader is in blockquotes.
Professor Caplan is betting that Trump will not die in office, resign, be removed by impeachment or otherwise permanently removed as per the 25th amendment and that he would take office as POTUS on Jan 20, 2017.
The bet was originally made prior to Trump’s inauguration. However, neither BC nor his anonymous bettor have lost the bet yet, thanks to that little word ‘or’.
Jim W
Feb 28 2017 at 1:58pm
@Jeremy
Re-read the terms. If DJT never took the oath, the bet would have ended with Caplan losing. As it stands, the rest of the terms are still in effect.
Comments are closed.