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2012 Senate · NY

YouGov · fieldwork ended 2012-11-02 (4 days before the election) · 1,430 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 61% · Republican 29%

D+32.0

The certified result

Democrat 62.11% · Republican 21.28%

D+40.8

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 61 − 29 = 32.00
  2. Actual margin = 62.109 − 21.283 = 40.826
  3. Signed miss = 32.00 − (40.826) = -8.825
  4. Absolute miss = |-8.825| = 8.825

The poll overstated the Republican by 8.8 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30694, race ID 1492 (538 database).