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2014 House · IL-17

We Ask America · fieldwork ended 2014-10-21 (14 days before the election) · 442 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 55% · Republican 39%

D+16.0

The certified result

Democrat 55.46% · Republican 44.53%

D+10.9

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 55 − 39 = 16.00
  2. Actual margin = 55.457 − 44.535 = 10.922
  3. Signed miss = 16.00 − (10.922) = 5.078
  4. Absolute miss = |5.078| = 5.078

The poll overstated the Democrat by 5.1 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 36080, race ID 5480 (538 database).