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2008 House · KY-4

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2008-10-26 (9 days before the election) · 591 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 37% · Republican 58%

R+21.0

The certified result

Democrat 36.97% · Republican 63.03%

R+26.1

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 37 − 58 = -21.00
  2. Actual margin = 36.966 − 63.034 = -26.068
  3. Signed miss = -21.00 − (-26.068) = 5.067
  4. Absolute miss = |5.067| = 5.067

The poll overstated the Democrat by 5.1 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 64358, race ID 4194 (538 database).