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2008 President · PA

American Research Group · fieldwork ended 2008-10-30 (5 days before the election) · 600 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 51% · Republican 45%

D+6.0

The certified result

Democrat 54.49% · Republican 44.17%

D+10.3

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 51 − 45 = 6.00
  2. Actual margin = 54.486 − 44.167 = 10.319
  3. Signed miss = 6.00 − (10.319) = -4.318
  4. Absolute miss = |-4.318| = 4.318

The poll overstated the Republican by 4.3 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16501, race ID 742 (538 database).