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2008 Governor · MO

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2008-11-01 (3 days before the election) · 674 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 54% · Republican 39%

D+15.0

The certified result

Democrat 58.40% · Republican 39.49%

D+18.9

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 54 − 39 = 15.00
  2. Actual margin = 58.400 − 39.488 = 18.912
  3. Signed miss = 15.00 − (18.912) = -3.912
  4. Absolute miss = |-3.912| = 3.912

The poll overstated the Republican by 3.9 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16439, race ID 1315 (538 database).