2004 President · IA
Selzer & Co. · fieldwork ended 2004-10-27 (6 days before the election) · 806 respondents · Live Phone
The poll said
Democrat 48% · Republican 45%
D+3.0
The certified result
Democrat 49.23% · Republican 49.90%
R+0.7
The arithmetic
- Poll margin = 48 − 45 = 3.00
- Actual margin = 49.233 − 49.901 = -0.668
- Signed miss = 3.00 − (-0.668) = 3.668
- Absolute miss = |3.668| = 3.668
The poll overstated the Democrat by 3.7 points and had the wrong leader.
Where these numbers come from
Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 4442, race ID 767 (538 database).