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2012 President · MI

Public Policy Polling · fieldwork ended 2012-11-02 (4 days before the election) · 700 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 52% · Republican 46%

D+6.0

The certified result

Democrat 54.21% · Republican 44.71%

D+9.5

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 52 − 46 = 6.00
  2. Actual margin = 54.208 − 44.711 = 9.497
  3. Signed miss = 6.00 − (9.497) = -3.497
  4. Absolute miss = |-3.497| = 3.497

The poll overstated the Republican by 3.5 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30637, race ID 675 (538 database).