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2008 President · OH

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2008-10-26 (9 days before the election) · 648 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 49% · Republican 45%

D+4.0

The certified result

Democrat 51.50% · Republican 46.91%

D+4.6

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 49 − 45 = 4.00
  2. Actual margin = 51.504 − 46.911 = 4.593
  3. Signed miss = 4.00 − (4.593) = -0.594
  4. Absolute miss = |-0.594| = 0.594

The poll overstated the Republican by 0.6 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16624, race ID 739 (538 database).