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2012 Senate · WI

Public Policy Polling · fieldwork ended 2012-11-02 (4 days before the election) · 1,256 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 51% · Republican 48%

D+3.0

The certified result

Democrat 51.41% · Republican 45.86%

D+5.5

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 51 − 48 = 3.00
  2. Actual margin = 51.409 − 45.860 = 5.549
  3. Signed miss = 3.00 − (5.549) = -2.549
  4. Absolute miss = |-2.549| = 2.549

The poll overstated the Republican by 2.5 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30666, race ID 1504 (538 database).