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2012 President · IA

Marist College · fieldwork ended 2012-10-28 (9 days before the election) · 1,142 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 50% · Republican 44%

D+6.0

The certified result

Democrat 51.99% · Republican 46.18%

D+5.8

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 50 − 44 = 6.00
  2. Actual margin = 51.988 − 46.178 = 5.810
  3. Signed miss = 6.00 − (5.810) = 0.190
  4. Absolute miss = |0.190| = 0.190

The poll overstated the Democrat by 0.2 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30539, race ID 665 (538 database).