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2004 Senate · NC

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2004-10-23 (10 days before the election) · 686 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 44% · Republican 50%

R+6.0

The certified result

Democrat 47.02% · Republican 51.60%

R+4.6

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 44 − 50 = -6.00
  2. Actual margin = 47.019 − 51.596 = -4.577
  3. Signed miss = -6.00 − (-4.577) = -1.423
  4. Absolute miss = |-1.423| = 1.423

The poll overstated the Republican by 1.4 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 4550, race ID 1636 (538 database).