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2013 Governor · VA

Roanoke College Institute for Policy and Opinion Research · fieldwork ended 2013-10-24 (12 days before the election) · 838 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 48% · Republican 33%

D+15.0

The certified result

Democrat 47.74% · Republican 45.22%

D+2.5

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 48 − 33 = 15.00
  2. Actual margin = 47.736 − 45.217 = 2.519
  3. Signed miss = 15.00 − (2.519) = 12.482
  4. Absolute miss = |12.482| = 12.482

The poll overstated the Democrat by 12.5 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 63979, race ID 1257 (538 database).