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2012 Senate · TN

YouGov · fieldwork ended 2012-11-02 (4 days before the election) · 697 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 29% · Republican 62%

R+33.0

The certified result

Democrat 30.41% · Republican 64.89%

R+34.5

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 29 − 62 = -33.00
  2. Actual margin = 30.407 − 64.892 = -34.485
  3. Signed miss = -33.00 − (-34.485) = 1.485
  4. Absolute miss = |1.485| = 1.485

The poll overstated the Democrat by 1.5 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30690, race ID 1497 (538 database).