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2008 House · NC-8

Public Policy Polling · fieldwork ended 2008-10-26 (9 days before the election) · 1,589 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 51% · Republican 46%

D+5.0

The certified result

Democrat 55.38% · Republican 44.62%

D+10.8

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 51 − 46 = 5.00
  2. Actual margin = 55.382 − 44.618 = 10.764
  3. Signed miss = 5.00 − (10.764) = -5.764
  4. Absolute miss = |-5.764| = 5.764

The poll overstated the Republican by 5.8 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 64182, race ID 4321 (538 database).