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2012 President · MO

YouGov · fieldwork ended 2012-11-02 (4 days before the election) · 779 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 42% · Republican 53%

R+11.0

The certified result

Democrat 44.38% · Republican 53.76%

R+9.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 42 − 53 = -11.00
  2. Actual margin = 44.383 − 53.764 = -9.381
  3. Signed miss = -11.00 − (-9.381) = -1.620
  4. Absolute miss = |-1.620| = 1.620

The poll overstated the Republican by 1.6 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30689, race ID 677 (538 database).