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2016 President · PA

Emerson College · fieldwork ended 2016-10-18 (21 days before the election) · 800 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 45% · Republican 41%

D+4.0

The certified result

Democrat 47.47% · Republican 48.18%

R+0.7

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 45 − 41 = 4.00
  2. Actual margin = 47.465 − 48.183 = -0.718
  3. Signed miss = 4.00 − (-0.718) = 4.718
  4. Absolute miss = |4.718| = 4.718

The poll overstated the Democrat by 4.7 points and had the wrong leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 47080, race ID 640 (538 database).