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2012 President · M2

Public Policy Polling · fieldwork ended 2012-11-01 (5 days before the election) · 768 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 51% · Republican 46%

D+5.0

The certified result

Democrat 52.94% · Republican 44.38%

D+8.6

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 51 − 46 = 5.00
  2. Actual margin = 52.940 − 44.379 = 8.561
  3. Signed miss = 5.00 − (8.561) = -3.561
  4. Absolute miss = |-3.561| = 3.561

The poll overstated the Republican by 3.6 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30621, race ID 8711 (538 database).