2008 President · national
Pew Research Center · fieldwork ended 2008-10-25 (10 days before the election) · 1,198 respondents · Live Phone
The poll said
Democrat 53% · Republican 38%
D+15.0
The certified result
Democrat 52.76% · Republican 45.36%
D+7.4
The arithmetic
- Poll margin = 53 − 38 = 15.00
- Actual margin = 52.760 − 45.360 = 7.400
- Signed miss = 15.00 − (7.400) = 7.600
- Absolute miss = |7.600| = 7.600
The poll overstated the Democrat by 7.6 points and had the right leader.
Where these numbers come from
Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 15379, race ID 38 (538 database).