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2008 President · AK

YouGov · fieldwork ended 2008-10-25 (10 days before the election) · 352 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 38% · Republican 55%

R+17.0

The certified result

Democrat 37.89% · Republican 59.42%

R+21.5

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 38 − 55 = -17.00
  2. Actual margin = 37.889 − 59.425 = -21.536
  3. Signed miss = -17.00 − (-21.536) = 4.535
  4. Absolute miss = |4.535| = 4.535

The poll overstated the Democrat by 4.5 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16449, race ID 704 (538 database).