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2008 Senate · MI

Public Policy Polling · fieldwork ended 2008-10-29 (6 days before the election) · 1,532 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 58% · Republican 36%

D+22.0

The certified result

Democrat 62.66% · Republican 33.85%

D+28.8

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 58 − 36 = 22.00
  2. Actual margin = 62.665 − 33.846 = 28.819
  3. Signed miss = 22.00 − (28.819) = -6.819
  4. Absolute miss = |-6.819| = 6.819

The poll overstated the Republican by 6.8 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16528, race ID 1560 (538 database).