2014 House · IL-12
We Ask America · fieldwork ended 2014-10-21 (14 days before the election) · 442 respondents · IVR
The poll said
Democrat 42% · Republican 44%
R+2.0
The certified result
Democrat 41.89% · Republican 52.47%
R+10.6
The arithmetic
- Poll margin = 42 − 44 = -2.00
- Actual margin = 41.890 − 52.465 = -10.575
- Signed miss = -2.00 − (-10.575) = 8.574
- Absolute miss = |8.574| = 8.574
The poll overstated the Democrat by 8.6 points and had the right leader.
Where these numbers come from
Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 36080, race ID 5475 (538 database).