Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
As I've said so many times, polls mean nothing. People are foolhardy to even pay attention to those things. I don't. Most of them are manipulative and simply designed to sway public opinion. My mind's made up who my vote goes to whenever I head to the precincts.
Every politician (including Trump)....well in the world actually...have their own internal pollsters and they are usually pretty close to the mark. There must be something to them otherwise that wouldn't be the case.
You underestimate me. I fully understand how they work and cynicism has nothing to do with it, but go ahead and accuse. As to their accuracy...that's your opinion.
Unless you have done graduate level statistics work, you do not “fully understand” them.
The fact that you think you do indicates that you’re basically at the early peak of the Dunning-Kruger curve.
Trump's current average is the same as last time right around 42%. The difference is Biden is averaging 52% instead of the 46% Hillary had the week before the election.
It’s kind of sad to me because you and many others have chosen cynicism over understanding how polling works. Polls are quite accurate if you understand how probabilities work.
Again, people who say things like that haven’t taken any time to understand how polls work and prefer to take the route of cynicism instead. Sad....and intellectually lazy.
I wouldn’t say intellectual lazy, just don’t trust them.
I have a few thoughts about this. One, it could be people just not knowing the number or being at work and not being able to answer your phone. I don't and I'm not a Trump voter. Only had one poll and it was about some prop that wasn't even on the ballot I sent out Saturday. Two, it is not the first time I heard Trump voters trying to subvert polls. I talked about 2016 Trump voters who admitted to lying to pollsters since the polls are fake anyway.
It’s kind of sad to me because you and many others have chosen cynicism over understanding how polling works. Polls are quite accurate if you understand how probabilities work.
Explaining probability goes like this...
If you had X people in a room, what are the chances two people will share a birthday?
With just 23 people, there's a 50% chance that two people will share a birthday. It doesn't matter which 23 people, any 23 people.
With just 75 people, there's a 99.9% chance. It doesn't matter which 75 people, just any 75 people.
The idea with polling is that the only polling that polls everybody only occurs every 2-4 years (the actual election). If we poll 1000 people, it shouldn't matter which 1000 people. You'd expect similar results but not the same results. However, pollsters try to be smart about it. They recognize that it is possible that 1000 people might not accurately represent people. It is possible they oversample Democrats, Republicans or Independents. That's where the margin of error comes into play. Hence, the value of something like the RCP average. Instead, we essentially have a poll of tens of thousands of Americans.
Even in 2016, nationally they were only off by 1.1 points. That's impressive.
And the thing is, when the polls are within 3%, you have that chance of a popular vote / Electoral College disparity. But as that margin goes beyond 3%, the chances of 75 people not sharing a birthday drop to below 0.1%.
If you had X people in a room, what are the chances two people will share a birthday?
With just 23 people, there's a 50% chance that two people will share a birthday. It doesn't matter which 23 people, any 23 people.
With just 75 people, there's a 99.9% chance. It doesn't matter which 75 people, just any 75 people.
The idea with polling is that the only polling that polls everybody only occurs every 2-4 years (the actual election). If we poll 1000 people, it shouldn't matter which 1000 people. You'd expect similar results but not the same results. However, pollsters try to be smart about it. They recognize that it is possible that 1000 people might not accurately represent people. It is possible they oversample Democrats, Republicans or Independents. That's where the margin of error comes into play. Hence, the value of something like the RCP average. Instead, we essentially have a poll of tens of thousands of Americans.
Even in 2016, nationally they were only off by 1.1 points. That's impressive.
And the thing is, when the polls are within 3%, you have that chance of a popular vote / Electoral College disparity. But as that margin goes beyond 3%, the chances of 75 people not sharing a birthday drop to below 0.1%.
That’s really not how it works.
This is a good introduction, but it’s only a high level introduction. Taking 8 minutes to watch it will not make an expert on polling.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
