I put a question on Predictify.com asking how many of my new book would be in print by the end of January. The average of the predictions is over 304,000. http://www.predictify.com/AuctionView.aspx?ID=176 [no longer available]
As the creator of the question, I get special rights to look at the demographics of the predictors to see what kind of correlations there are. I noticed there isn’t much difference in the predictions by religion or gender or level of education and so on. But two categories jumped out.
Notice the difference in average predictions by political affiliation:
Republicans: 352,000
Democrats: 286,000
Independents: 275,000
Are Republicans more optimistic than Democrats, and are they projecting that optimism on my book? That’s my hypothesis. And it tracks with the fact that independents have the lowest predictions. I think the cynics and pessimists are the people least likely to be part of an organized movement.
The other big difference in predictions was by employment:
Students: 325,000
Employed: 295,000
Unemployed: 164,000
Those predictions also track with what I imagine is the level of optimism for those demographic groups. Students are idealistic and don’t appreciate how hard the real world is going to be. They are optimists. People with jobs are likely to be far more optimistic than unemployed people.
Hypothetically, suppose researchers confirmed that Republicans are the most optimistic people by nature. Since optimism is an important contributor to success, if you were trying to fill a position in your company, would it make economic sense to favor Republicans, even if you held a different political view?
Speaking of my book, Stick to Drawing Comics, Monkey-Brain!, that I am shamelessly plugging all week, here’s a link to Amazon, or you can get it in your local bookstore. (I gave you two posts today to compensate for my inexcusable capitalism.)