"Who makes the odds" Dumb question says E.J. Minnis from practical punter. The "idiot" books take off like wild fire with those wanting to easily digest and understand information.
So who does make the odds? If we are refering to those availabe from the TAB operators,then they really are not odds at all-rather the dividends paid out in accordance with the winning tickets and collective value in the totalisator pools.
Leaving aside the TAB takeouts and other factors such as the rounding-down effect,if there was a win pool of $100,000 with $20,000 winning $1 tickets,then the dividend would be $5.
Simply put,the dividens paid out by by the tote opertators are determined by the punters themselves in accordance with how much [collectively] they invest on each race.