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2004 President · national

Zogby Analytics · fieldwork ended 2004-10-30 (3 days before the election) · 1,200 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 47% · Republican 48%

R+1.0

The certified result

Democrat 48.13% · Republican 50.57%

R+2.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 47 − 48 = -1.00
  2. Actual margin = 48.130 − 50.573 = -2.443
  3. Signed miss = -1.00 − (-2.443) = 1.444
  4. Absolute miss = |1.444| = 1.444

The poll overstated the Democrat by 1.4 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 15745, race ID 39 (538 database).