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1998 Governor · RI

KRC Research · fieldwork ended 1998-10-18 (16 days before the election) · 400 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 45% · Republican 47%

R+2.0

The certified result

Democrat 42.13% · Republican 50.97%

R+8.8

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 45 − 47 = -2.00
  2. Actual margin = 42.130 − 50.965 = -8.835
  3. Signed miss = -2.00 − (-8.835) = 6.835
  4. Absolute miss = |6.835| = 6.835

The poll overstated the Democrat by 6.8 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 54412, race ID 1460 (538 database).