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2008 President · national

Harris Insights & Analytics · fieldwork ended 2008-11-01 (3 days before the election) · 3,946 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 52% · Republican 44%

D+8.0

The certified result

Democrat 52.76% · Republican 45.36%

D+7.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 52 − 44 = 8.00
  2. Actual margin = 52.760 − 45.360 = 7.400
  3. Signed miss = 8.00 − (7.400) = 0.600
  4. Absolute miss = |0.600| = 0.600

The poll overstated the Democrat by 0.6 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 15185, race ID 38 (538 database).