[washingtonismoney]

... (both because I'm sort of skeptical that any market is actually efficient in the real world, except perhaps the largest betting markets, maybe these types of things are big enough but I'm not sure that college game spreads are big enough). ...

Right. In practice, of course, markets aren't necessarily perfectly efficient. But certain markets are. For example, the number of people who should be doing anything other than index funds for their retirement investing is super, super small. The stock market is pretty efficient. My suspicion is that the big sports gambling markets are too. But again, I haven't seen good empirical data. And I'm surprised that no one's done a good, comprehensive study on this -- because it seems both fascinating, and relatively easy (by academic study standards.)

[washingtonismoney]

... (both because I'm sort of skeptical that any market is actually efficient in the real world, except perhaps the largest betting markets, maybe these types of things are big enough but I'm not sure that college game spreads are big enough). ...

Right. In practice, of course, markets aren't necessarily perfectly efficient. But certain markets are. For example, the number of people who should be doing anything other than index funds for their retirement investing is super, super small. The stock market is pretty efficient. My suspicion is that the big sports gambling markets are too. But again, I haven't seen good empirical data. And I'm surprised that no one's done a good, comprehensive study on this -- because it seems both fascinating, and relatively easy (by academic study standards.)