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2008 Senate · SC

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2008-10-28 (7 days before the election) · 654 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 39% · Republican 58%

R+19.0

The certified result

Democrat 42.25% · Republican 57.52%

R+15.3

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 39 − 58 = -19.00
  2. Actual margin = 42.247 − 57.525 = -15.278
  3. Signed miss = -19.00 − (-15.278) = -3.722
  4. Absolute miss = |-3.722| = 3.722

The poll overstated the Republican by 3.7 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16573, race ID 1573 (538 database).