2004 President · FL
SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2004-10-16 (17 days before the election) · 601 respondents · IVR
The poll said
Democrat 50% · Republican 49%
D+1.0
The certified result
Democrat 47.09% · Republican 52.10%
R+5.0
The arithmetic
- Poll margin = 50 − 49 = 1.00
- Actual margin = 47.091 − 52.098 = -5.007
- Signed miss = 1.00 − (-5.007) = 6.006
- Absolute miss = |6.006| = 6.006
The poll overstated the Democrat by 6.0 points and had the wrong leader.
Where these numbers come from
Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 4672, race ID 764 (538 database).