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2012 President · PA

Public Policy Polling · fieldwork ended 2012-11-02 (4 days before the election) · 790 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 52% · Republican 46%

D+6.0

The certified result

Democrat 51.97% · Republican 46.59%

D+5.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 52 − 46 = 6.00
  2. Actual margin = 51.972 − 46.587 = 5.385
  3. Signed miss = 6.00 − (5.385) = 0.615
  4. Absolute miss = |0.615| = 0.615

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

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30665, race ID 691 (538 database).