Skip to content

2016 President · GA

Emerson College · fieldwork ended 2016-10-30 (9 days before the election) · 650 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 42% · Republican 51%

R+9.0

The certified result

Democrat 45.64% · Republican 50.77%

R+5.1

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 42 − 51 = -9.00
  2. Actual margin = 45.640 − 50.771 = -5.131
  3. Signed miss = -9.00 − (-5.131) = -3.869
  4. Absolute miss = |-3.869| = 3.869

The poll overstated the Republican by 3.9 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 48080, race ID 612 (538 database).