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Why National
Polls are Worthless
The
US presidential election is NOT one election. It is really 51
separate elections which are held on the same day. The
pollsters obviously have forgotten this fact. The winner
of the popular vote count does NOT necessarily win the election.
Just ask AL GORE. Four candidates for president have won
the popular vote and yet have lost the presidential election.
Here they are:
Year Popular Vote % of Election % of Others %
Winner vote Winner vote of vote
2000 Albert Gore 48.38 George W. Bush 47.87 3.75
1888 Grover Cleveland 48.63 Benjamin Harrison 47.80 3.57
1876 Samuel Tilden 50.92 Rutherford B. Hayes 47.92 1.16
1824 Andrew Jackson 41.36 John Q. Adams 30.92 27.72
A quick lesson in statistical sampling
The
uncertainty in a sample or the error range is given by 100/ (square
root of sample size). Thus we obtain the following table of
error ranges for various sample sizes.
Sampling errors in polls
Samples error %
10 31.6
20 22.4
30 18.3
40 15.8
50 13
100 10
200 7
300 5.8
400 5
500 4.5
600 4
700 3.8
800 3.5
900 3.33
1000 3.2
1225 3.0
2000 2.2
2500 2.0
5000 1.4
10000 1.0
In 48 states and DC, the winner of the popular vote receives ALL the electors of that
state (or DC). Only Maine and Nebraska give electoral votes proportionally.
The candidate who receives a majority of the electoral votes wins the
election - NOT the candidate who receives the largest number of popular
votes.
Let us
examine the results of the 2004 & 2000 elections for the states of
California, New York, and Texas.
2004 Kerry Bush Difference Kerry % Bush % Diff
California 6,745,485 5,509,826 1,235,659 54.3 44.4 K+10%
Texas 2,832,704 4,526,917 1,694,213 38.2 61.1 B+23%
New York 4,314,280 2,962,567 1,351,713 58.4 40.1 K+18%
2000 Gore Bush Difference Gore % Bush % Diff
California 5,861,203 4,567,429 1,293,774 53.5 41.7 G+12%
Texas 2,433,746 3,799,639 1,365,893 38.0 59.3 B+21%
New York 4,107,907 2,403,374 1,704,533 60.2 35.2 G+25%
We see that Democrats win California by
about 11% and New York by about 22% while Republicans win Texas by
about 22%
Suppose the pollster
selects a sample size of 1000 likely voters
If the sample is divided among 50 states & DC = 19.6 voters each.
Thus each individual poll would have an error of 22.5%.
I believe this would be WORTHLESS.
Suppose the 1000 votes are divided proportionally
(by population) among the 50 states & DC. Then we would
get the following:
2004 2000
California = 12.12% = 121 votes (9% error) K+10% G+12%
Texas = 7.93% = 79 votes (11% error) B+23% B+21%
New York = 6.4% = 64 votes (12.5% error) K+18% G+25%
Florida = 6.05% = 61 votes (13%) B+5% B+0
Illinois = 4.25 = 42 votes (15.4%) K+10% G+12%
Pennsylvania = 4.12 = 41 votes (15.5%) K+2.5% G+4%
Ohio = 3.80 = 38 votes (16%) B+2.0% B+3.5%
Michigan = 3.34 = 33 votes (17%) K+3.4% G+5%
Georgia = 3.16 = 32 votes (18%) B+17% B+13%
North Carolina = 3.0 = 30 votes (18.5%) B+12% B+13%
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541 votes = 54.1% of the voters
1000 – 541 = 459 divided by 41 remaining states & DC give 11 each (30 % error)
This gives an average error of about 20% - which is really WORTHLESS.
Suppose the pollster selects a sample of 1000 likely voters from California
Then the Democrat will lead by 11% = WORTHLESS
Suppose the pollster selects a sample of 1000 likely voters from New York
Then the Democrat will lead by 22% = WORTHLESS
Suppose the pollster selects a sample of 1000 likely voters from Texas
Then the Republican will lead by 22% = WORTHLESS
Comments? Email me at crwillis@androidworld.com
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