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2012 President · NY

Siena College · fieldwork ended 2012-10-23 (14 days before the election) · 750 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 59% · Republican 35%

D+24.0

The certified result

Democrat 60.76% · Republican 31.24%

D+29.5

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 59 − 35 = 24.00
  2. Actual margin = 60.761 − 31.242 = 29.519
  3. Signed miss = 24.00 − (29.519) = -5.519
  4. Absolute miss = |-5.519| = 5.519

The poll overstated the Republican by 5.5 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30337, race ID 687 (538 database).