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2012 Governor · MO

Public Policy Polling · fieldwork ended 2012-11-02 (4 days before the election) · 835 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 53% · Republican 45%

D+8.0

The certified result

Democrat 54.77% · Republican 42.53%

D+12.2

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 53 − 45 = 8.00
  2. Actual margin = 54.770 − 42.534 = 12.236
  3. Signed miss = 8.00 − (12.236) = -4.236
  4. Absolute miss = |-4.236| = 4.236

The poll overstated the Republican by 4.2 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30683, race ID 1261 (538 database).