2008 President · IA
Selzer & Co. · fieldwork ended 2008-10-30 (5 days before the election) · 814 respondents · Live Phone
The poll said
Democrat 54% · Republican 37%
D+17.0
The certified result
Democrat 53.93% · Republican 44.39%
D+9.5
The arithmetic
- Poll margin = 54 − 37 = 17.00
- Actual margin = 53.928 − 44.393 = 9.535
- Signed miss = 17.00 − (9.535) = 7.465
- Absolute miss = |7.465| = 7.465
The poll overstated the Democrat by 7.5 points and had the right leader.
Where these numbers come from
Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16503, race ID 716 (538 database).