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2008 President · UT

YouGov · fieldwork ended 2008-10-25 (10 days before the election) · 395 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 34% · Republican 61%

R+27.0

The certified result

Democrat 34.41% · Republican 62.58%

R+28.2

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 34 − 61 = -27.00
  2. Actual margin = 34.406 − 62.584 = -28.178
  3. Signed miss = -27.00 − (-28.178) = 1.178
  4. Absolute miss = |1.178| = 1.178

The poll overstated the Democrat by 1.2 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16472, race ID 748 (538 database).