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2012 President · IL

YouGov · fieldwork ended 2012-11-02 (4 days before the election) · 1,126 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 57% · Republican 38%

D+19.0

The certified result

Democrat 57.60% · Republican 40.73%

D+16.9

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 57 − 38 = 19.00
  2. Actual margin = 57.602 − 40.733 = 16.869
  3. Signed miss = 19.00 − (16.869) = 2.131
  4. Absolute miss = |2.131| = 2.131

The poll overstated the Democrat by 2.1 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30701, race ID 667 (538 database).