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1998 House · OR-1

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 1998-11-01 (2 days before the election) · 400 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 45% · Republican 49%

R+4.0

The certified result

Democrat 50.10% · Republican 47.11%

D+3.0

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 45 − 49 = -4.00
  2. Actual margin = 50.102 − 47.110 = 2.992
  3. Signed miss = -4.00 − (2.992) = -6.992
  4. Absolute miss = |-6.992| = 6.992

The poll overstated the Republican by 7.0 points and had the wrong leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 64262, race ID 2171 (538 database).