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2004 Senate · PA

Quinnipiac University · fieldwork ended 2004-10-29 (4 days before the election) · 1,022 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 33% · Republican 53%

R+20.0

The certified result

Democrat 41.99% · Republican 52.62%

R+10.6

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 33 − 53 = -20.00
  2. Actual margin = 41.987 − 52.618 = -10.631
  3. Signed miss = -20.00 − (-10.631) = -9.370
  4. Absolute miss = |-9.370| = 9.370

The poll overstated the Republican by 9.4 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 4370, race ID 1641 (538 database).