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1998 Governor · MA

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 1998-10-28 (6 days before the election) · 500 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 44% · Republican 48%

R+4.0

The certified result

Democrat 47.38% · Republican 50.81%

R+3.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 44 − 48 = -4.00
  2. Actual margin = 47.382 − 50.814 = -3.432
  3. Signed miss = -4.00 − (-3.432) = -0.568
  4. Absolute miss = |-0.568| = 0.568

The poll overstated the Republican by 0.6 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 54310, race ID 1448 (538 database).