this post was submitted on 22 Jul 2024
-31 points (21.8% liked)

politics

19170 readers
4502 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

  1. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  2. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  3. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
  4. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  5. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] dragontamer@lemmy.world 0 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

If I make a bet with you, person to person, then it might just be putting my money where my mouth is. I think Harris wins, and offer you $20 if she does, and if Trump wins then you give me $30. (That’s exactly 3:2 odds there, which is what 40% odds of winning should work out to.)

And I can make bets to about $5000ish for the lulz. And I HAVE made lulzy bets using call options for shits and giggles just to mess with coworkers and their opinions on the stock market.

Because I have enough wealth that even $5000 doesn't affect me, win or lose. I'm not even that rich, I just know how much is in my lulz spending allocation per month.

An actual millionaire or billionaire will be able to do the same lulz bet at the 50-Million range.

Small amounts of money is no object to me, where small is ~single digit thousands for me. Richer people within my family bought a house all in cash the other day, because fuck it it's within our capabilities and we don't sweat small amounts of money.

At my lifestyle (and for everyone richer than me), money is primarily conspicuous spending to show how rich we are to each other. Basic needs are already handled so it's all lulz money here on out.


Your assumption that $30 would be even an ounce of my thought is hugely mistaken. That's just fucking nothing, it's well below the threshold that I bother thinking of anymore.

Instead, I know that people like you actually care about money. I can manipulate you because my care for money is so much less than you and seed the odds in the favor. Ex: I can pretend I'm sure of something, throw $5000 bet into some call options or put options to pretend I'm serious (when really I don't care), because I know that $5000 is serious money to someone like you.

It's not a polite thing to do, I don't like it when other rich people manipulate poorer people like this. But it's something within my capabilities.

[–] HelixDab2@lemm.ee 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

...The point is so far over your head that I'm going to assume that you're willfully ignoring it.

You might--might--be able to manipulate the odds with a single bookie. But most bookies also cap bets from any single person or source, because, hey, it turns out that they actually know what they're doing, since you don't stay in business long as a bookie if you don't. Could you pay people to make sock puppet accounts? Sure. But the number of sock puppet accounts you would need to do that--and the number of bank accounts--mean that it would be noisy to do. (You could give 10,000 people each $500 to wager, but I don't think that all 10k would actually place the bet, and I still don't think that would be enough to move markets significantly.)

I think you underestimate the amount of money that's involved here. The sports betting market in the US is worth about $13B, and I would guess--not bet--that the political market is likely around $1B or so, although it's going to be peaking in November, rather than spread out over the year.

Ex: I can pretend I’m sure of something, throw $5000 bet into some call options or put options to pretend I’m serious (when really I don’t care)

I can, and have, bet on things where someone is, or acts like they are, sure of themselves, and I know for a fact that they're full of shit. I've won every single one of those bets, because gambling is a tax on people that can't do math.

[–] dragontamer@lemmy.world 0 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

…The point is so far over your head that I’m going to assume that you’re willfully ignoring it.

You're the one ignoring my point.

Rich people do not give a shit about money. Especially lulzy bets we make on the internet.

I can, and have, bet on things where someone is, or acts like they are, sure of themselves, and I know for a fact that they’re full of shit. I’ve won every single one of those bets, because gambling is a tax on people that can’t do math.

I can, and have, bet on things because I don't give a shit. Just to bully someone else out of their money and to back down.

I think you underestimate the amount of money that’s involved here. The sports betting market in the US is worth about $13B, and I would guess–not bet–that the political market is likely around $1B or so, although it’s going to be peaking in November, rather than spread out over the year.

Cool. Elon Musk is donating $50 Million to Trump per month. A single Billionaire like Musk can manipulate a small market of $1B bookies quite easily.

Look up the size of these political donations. All of that money is "wasted", Billionaires don't expect political donations to come back and give them money. Its just a way of expressing support in rich people culture.

[–] HelixDab2@lemm.ee 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

A single Billionaire like Musk can manipulate a small market of $1B bookies quite easily.

How, exactly, would he do that? Given the way that banking laws work, and given that book makers limit bets from any single person, any way he was trying to circumvent their limits would be blatantly obvious.

All of that money is “wasted”, Billionaires don’t expect political donations to come back and give them money.

Blatantly false. Billionaires largely expect the politicians they support to enact policies that they either agree with, or policies that will help them accumulate more wealth/retain more wealth. Musk gives money to Trump because Trump cuts Musk's taxes, while Biden (and now Harris) have been talking about changing tax policies so that corporations have fewer loopholes. (Plus, the NLRB under Biden has brought a number of civil actions against Tesla.) It is very much a quid pro quo kind of situation, not just an 'attaboy'.

[–] dragontamer@lemmy.world 1 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

How, exactly, would he do that? Given the way that banking laws work, and given that book makers limit bets from any single person, any way he was trying to circumvent their limits would be blatantly obvious.

"Here's $50 Million bucks. Go make Donald Trump's odds slightly better in a way that makes you lose upto $40-million bucks. Keep $10 million for yourself"

Also, don't put it on the books. This is a gift.