By Ben Glickler
Ever since Sarah Palin joined the GOP ticket, those of us who get a kick out of following politics have heard some fantastic arguments coming from pundits and advocates on all sides. Sarah Palin has a lot of executive experience due to being a small-town mayor; alternatively, she governed a big-whoop state of 600,000 for a big-whoop two years.
Obama has a lengthy record of serving the public due to being a community organizer; or, if you like, he spent two years in the Senate doing nothing before hitting the campaign trail. Each side is trying to make the case that their guy (or gal) is ready for the big job despite having a slim record in politics — but they’re also trying to make sure we know that the other side is completely unprepared because of their slim record in politics. Most people can’t walk that thin line, and the result is often unintentionally hilarious.
All of this made me wonder if there’s any merit to the debate, so I decided to answer that question… with math. I figured that, given the right data, we can figure out if there’s any correlation between a candidate’s prior experience and how that candidate will perform as president.
Performance was easy to calculate. I took the most recent Wall Street Journal and Siena Research Institute rankings, averaged them, and dumped them into a spreadsheet.
Experience was harder to figure out. Different kinds of experience have mattered at different times in American history. There’s also the problem of comparing eight years as lieutenant governor of
Lastly, I needed the information to be relevant, so I only looked at post-WWII presidents. There are eleven presidents since FDR, so I divide them into three groups based on length of experience.
More likely to be great — or lousy
The first group includes the guys with national experience ranging from zero to 10 years in office. That gives us Eisenhower, Carter, Reagan and George W. Bush. Mathematically, these guys are likely to be average presidents, but the standard deviation is large. That means we might get a fantastic president, but we’re just as likely to get a lousy president. Voting for Obama or Palin is therefore like flipping a coin: heads, we get Abraham Lincoln; tails, we get Jimmy Carter.
The middle group is interesting because they’ve got the highest average rankings combined with an average standard deviation. Those presidents include Clinton, Truman, Kennedy and the first George Bush, all guys with about a dozen years of prior experience. Neither candidate currently running for office falls into that range, so we’ll move on.
More likely to be average
The last group includes all the guys with 14 years or more of national experience, which means Nixon, Ford, and Johnson. Their rankings make them below average, but this group has the smallest standard deviation of the three. That means we’re probably going to get a president who is basically acceptable or a bit below average. We’re unlikely to get a real winner, but we’re unlikely to get a real loser either. Voting for McCain or Biden is therefore like flipping a coin too: Heads, we get Gerald Ford, tails, we get Gerald Ford.
Importantly, we have to recognize that there are some very large standard deviations here. There really isn’t a significant experience-to-success correlation, just some slight trends… but that’s kind of the point. Candidates with less experience are slightly more likely to be terrible or wonderful rather than average. Candidates with more experience are slightly more likely to be average rather than terrible or wonderful.
It’s been this way throughout history
I went back and put all presidents into the spreadsheet, and found out that it’s been this way for all of American history. The first third of presidents in terms of years of experience are ranked highest, but it’s a volatile group that includes both FDR and George W. Bush. And the last third has the most experienced and lowest-ranked presidents, but they’re slightly less likely to be heroes or duds due to there being a lower standard deviation among their rankings.
I also discovered that McCain, if elected, would be tied for most-experienced president in history. Biden, if he became president, would break that record by 10 years. Conversely, Obama and Palin would both be in the top 10 or 12 for inexperience. Against the context of history, both people on both tickets are practically caricatures of experience and inexperience, which makes this experiment even more interesting.
What does this all mean? Translating things back from math into presidents gives us a few hints. Presidents in the bottom third — those with the least experience — have an average presidential ranking of 16. Presidents in the top third — those with the most experience — have an average presidential ranking of 24. That’s the range Bill Clinton lands in, so if you think he was a great president, you’ll like inexperienced guys, and if you think he was a lousy president, you’ll want the candidate with more years under his belt. But the guys with the least experience also have a standard deviation that’s almost 20 percent higher than the experienced presidents have, meaning you’re taking a bigger risk when you vote for them. Risk versus reliability? People who like
The results derived from this experiment can’t be called remotely conclusive — at least, not conclusive in terms of proving that experience has a significant impact on a president’s success.
Glickler is a graduate of