I dare to add to Nate Silver’s thoughts
Robert Waldmann
Nate Silver gives five reasons that Republicans might do better than his model predicts and five reasons that Democrats might do better.
I add two more possible reasons that Democrats might do better after the jump. They are numbered 3.1 and 3.2, because they are variants on his third reason
More on likely voter filters.
3.1 Likely voter filters include to many people over 65 compared to people age 30-40.
3.2 Likely voter polls are too far from registered voter polls when they are very far from registered voter polls.
Long arguments for both below. First 2 facts support LV polls. 1 They didn’t have a meaningful pro-Republican bias in the past. RV voter polls therefore had a pro Democratic bias in the past of around 4% (or is that calculated with this elections congressional generics ? I got the number here). 2 They are on average closer to the outcome than RV polls.
So why might it be different this time ? One is Silver’s argument 3.
3.1 Another reason is that much of the success of LV filters might be due to their indirectly conditioning on age. Age has a huge effect on the probability of voting. Many LV questions clearly relate to age. For example \”I always vote\” does not mean \”I have voted in every election since I turned 18\” but \”I have voted in almost all general elections since so long ago it doesn’t matter.\” It must be a slowly changing function of past voting. This means that, since actual voting increases sharply up till age 35 then more slowly thereafter, answers to the question will tend to remove too many 35-50 year olds. Taking the word \”always\” literally, the answer can only move from \”I always vote\” to \”I don’t always vote\” the probability of answering yes would never increase. I’d guess that it increases but much too slowly.
I’d guess that following elections closely will have even more to do with being retired than actual voting.
Some Gallup questions very clearly select on age. One is have you voted at your current polling place (another is do you know where it is?). This is partly about past voting and partly about \”have you moved since the last election\”
Now I guess that LV filters would not be fixed if it turned out that \”likely voters\” were significantly more likely to be over 65 than actual voters. I guess that LV filters are mainly chosen and changed based on the performance of past polls with the LV filter in predicting the result (that is the bottom line).
This means a major change in the probability of voting as a function of age and change in the probability of supporting the Democrats as a funciton of age will both make the past data on the reliability of LV polls invalid.
We know that support for Republicans currently increases steeply with age all the way up. It wasn’t always this way. It used to be about level age 40 and up with an actual hump of self identified Republicans in generation X. The huge shift in the association of age and partisan support is part of the explaination of the huge increase in the LV-RV gap and also a reason that it might be a failure of LV filters.
3.2 A third reason it might be different this time, is just that current gaps are unusual, and maybe when the gap is unusual likely voter polls do badly. This can happen if say paying attention to the election is moderately associated with voters but huge swings in partisan differences in paying attention are not correlated with the predicted very large swings in voting. I’d guess there is more of a bandwagon effect in paying attention. I sure wouldn’t blame Democrats who don’t want to hear about the elections this year provided they vote.
This is all that the majority of U.S. voters need to remember:
“The days of the do-nothing Congress are over,” declared Democratic Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, in line to become majority leader, adding that Americans spoke “clearly and decisively in favor of Democrats leading this country in a new direction.” – November 2006
Almost four years later (46 months), Obama still blames Bush and all Republicans for everything. Without exception.
Obama never blames his Administration nor the Democratic leadership in the Congress for anything. This guy never takes responsibility for a damn thing. Zip.
The majority of citizens in the U.S. may be sick of listening to the weak leader crap. We should know Tuesday night.
You can’t complain that the Democrats haven’t done enough given the unprecedented Republican obstruction.
I was discussing how to predict who would win the election. Your pure declaration of partisanship is off topic.
On Blaming Bush, I just note that this is an economics blog and some familiarity with standard VAR estimates of macro variables is to be expected. Recall the increase in the growth rate following in the 2 months and in the 3 quarters following eanctement of the ARRA was the greatest since Carter was President. Such a rapid increase in growth has not occured since Reagan was elected.
It was not enough to get the economy back into good shape, but all realiby based people agree on which party proposed a better approach including Mark Zandi an economic advisor on John McCain’s campaign.
But sorry, that was off topic. The topic was interpreting polls to predict elections.
Using economics to predict polls.
Most people know nothing about economics. Most people know when jobs are available and when unemployment is high because people and their families experience unemployment first hand.
IF jobs are plenty, voters will give incumbents high marks. If unemployment is high, voters will not favor incumbents. These are the swing voters who swing from one party to another. The majority of voters stick with one of the two parties. So polls equal party loyalists plus whatever fraction of swing voters.
The economy was bad in 2008 so swing voters massively favored challengers over incumbents. Today, the economy is still bad and swing voters still favor challengers over incumbents.
Just a point on the “voted at your polling station before” element to the filter. The sharp drop in housing and job turn-over during the recession and the recovery make a rise in “yes” answers very likely, but for reasons that don’t match with the assumption behind the filter. Rather than “stable” or “over X years of age”, a “yes” answer for many will mean “mortgage under water” or “didn’t move to a new job ’cause there weren’t any”.
Robert,
I’ll interpret the polls.
10% Unemployment.
As for the Dems not doing enough? You got to be kidding me. This election is a backlash against what they have done!
And I note that Bush Jr showed more leadership skills than Obama has. Bush got legislation passed with far less congressional majorities than Obama. After Nov 2006 when Reid made that comment MG quoted, and the Dems were elected promising to end the war, guess what. Bush got overwelming bi-partisan support FOR the war from the Dem congress – every time! Heck we went to war with full Democratic support along with passing all those laws right after 9/11. None of which Obama and the fili-buster proof Dem majorities made even the slightest effort to repeal – even after all the sturm and drang from the left. How’s Gitmo going these days? NPR says the 57 Yemeni will be there forever becuase the “politics is terrible.” So much for Obama bringing back teh rule of law!
The bottom line is that Bush managed to get legislation passed that he wanted even in the face of a Dem filibuster, when every leftie was crowing about his unpopularity and he was considered a lame duck. Yet Obama, with overwelming Dem majorities, and huge popularity can’t get it done??? basically you just stated that Bush was better at running the Presidency than Obama. Reality bites.
And don’t forget 10% unemployment.
Islam will change
I would add another reason to Dems doing better – voter fraud.
Islam will change
This is probably a question already dealt with, but what effect on polling does the migration to cell phones have? I am a retired gal — unusual I think in having abandoned my land line and moved completely to cell. Thinking of moving back next year, as a land line up here is about 1/4 the cost of cell.
Anyway — if pollsters don’t call cell numbers, then it seems to me their results would be altered in some way — toward people more stable in their homes, older, conservative in outlook, electronically challenged, timid… I w3onder how this is adjusted for?
I get so few junk calls on my cell that they are effectively zero. I have never had a polling call, except from the phone company itself.
And, I have already voted. All I can do this time around is one House representative, and I was very glad that it was an easy choice and he’s very likely to retain his seat. In other districts, I could easily see a split in families similar to the grey versus blue of the Civil War. God save America.
Details please.
It occurred to me on the way to work this AM that the comparison of crowd size between the Glenn Beck rally and the Stewart/Colbert rally might serve as a useful guide to turn out of one group of voters vs the other. Both groups could be assumed to be highly motivated and politically interested people given their attendance at either event. Both groups are, therefore, likely to be active voters. Airial photo estimates of the respective crowds puts the Stewart/Colbert attendees at about 2.5 times the number of Beck attendees, 210,000 vs 87,000.
It’s rogh, but it does show the level of intent and size of population for the two groups. It gives a more progressive ideologist hope for the furture. And Stewart did sound so much more reasonable than did Beck, even with Beck seeming to be on his best behavior.
What about propaganda?
The largest form of voter fraud is a lying media. If there is not truth what have you?
ilsm will not chnage
The Know Nothings were always a small radical minority, even 170 years ago.
Talking Dubya how ’bout his Rangers?
ilsm will not chnage
Elections are part of democracy, and so a good thing. However, they seem to have a sad effect on the intellect in some cases. Here’s Buffy, aping MG in rattling off partisan drivel as if it represents reality. Now, this is not a surprise, since Buffy started behaving like this before Obama was elected. (MG was kinda MIA at that time.) It’s just the raw, sort of “can’t help himself” tone of today’s effort that is, not new exactly, but just blatant. If one wanted to seem thoughtful, now would be the time to make the effort. Buffy and MG apparently just showed up to vent. The occassional pretense at actual thought is missing today.
Personally, I think the likely voter screens have it right and may be underestimating the breadth of the “enthusiasm gap” People are angry–they have been un or under employed for 2 yeras, their incomes are stagnant, they have lost their homes, they have seen health insurance premiums go up, they have seen the rich get richer while they have slid down the income scale and they want to blame somebody. The Dems have been in control for 2 years and have allowed the GOP to water down or block anything that might have turned things around and neither Obama nor Congress displayed any sense of urgency about the situation. That things are likely to get worse with the GOP controlling one or both houses of Congress is beyond most people. The result is not so much that people switch parties although those with loose party identification will, but rather the GOP voters can not wait to vote and the Dems are so demoralized that they say”why bother?” It is going to be very ugly for the Dems and I fear very ugly for the economy and if I am wrong than I will vote GOP in 2012. I only hope that if I am right that all the Dems who are sitting this one out will vote in 2012.
If you take Nate Silver’s list of 17 “generic preference” polls and do the simple bits of math that we all know, you can get a reasonable set of summary statistics. The mean is a 6.6% advantage for Republicans. The mode is a 6% advantage for Republicans. The median is a 6% advantage for Republicans. If you look at just the polls which show a 6% advantage for Republicans, half included cell phones, half did not.
I realize that a 6% GOP advantage could misrepresent reality. I realize that hope leads some of us to want to find reasons that the polls will be wrong. I realize that individual races are not won on generic votes. But people, if you want an unbiased assessment, look at the summary stats.
This result is quite strong this year and is probably the biggest potential upside for the Democrats. Pollsters usually adjust their sample to some “expected” demographics, but it’s not straightforward that that captures the entire cellphone divide. The number to keep in mind is that you can only reach 33% of the 18-30 demographic on a landline — at that point it’s reasonable to assume that those people you can reach are somehow different from the population as a whole. Cell adjustments haven’t been big in the past, but are up 50% or so over the 2008 cycle and now represent more than 25% of households, so it’s not out of this world to think that something will happen here.
Pew did a study a little while ago that put calling cellphones at +4 D relative to landline-only polls even after adjusting for demographics. This seems a little farfetched, but just on finger arithmetic I think you can get to a 1-2% move in a Democratic direction. Not enough to substantially change the result, but enough to make you want to take the under, anyhow.
Been at the my poll all morning, and at this writing we have one recorded instance of machine failure. What is funny is the tendency for the machines to fail with a Dem vote. Yes, that was the case here.
And, predictably, KH shows his ugly side. AGAIN! How can anyone be so consistently angry?
KH, if you are going to comment at least add value. The repetitive hit and run personal attacks do not indicate a very mature mind. No matter the age.
Sigh!
CoRev,
Cut kharris some slack. His whole worldview is about to be delivered an ass-kicking, along with the whole Socialist, er “Progressive” agenda. Plus their titular leader is starting to resemble Captain Queeg, without the charm.
You’d be cranky too!
Still waiting for some details, guys.
We have seen voting fraud — but it’s in the machines, in the lying robo-calls, in the bullies and biased registrars putting their thumbs on the scales. It’s in God-knows what financial powers pouring out a Niagara of dollars — American dollars scammed from Americans — and shoving their lying propaganda into our public airwaves. It’s from more dollars, foreign and domestic, cornering the discourse by buying up the media and setting a false and crazy agenda.
The fraud is not in some streetcorner guy with so much desire to participate in the democratic process that he would go to the bother of risking prison by double-registering, when millions won’t go to the bother of using the vote they are entitled to. By comparison to the huge frauds we know about, such a guy — if he existed — would be a public hero.
“…but rather the GOP voters can not wait to vote and the Dems are so demoralized that they say”why bother?”
terry,
What level of scientific observation is the basis for that comment? It is certainly the current meme of the broadcast media, but that group are corporate propagandists to the Nth degree. Teasing out corporate media BS from the relaity of a process is the mystery. The heart of the Tea Party ideology reswts in ignorance. They may very well come out to vote, but they are the extreme and their aggregate numbers are smaller than the mainstream of American politics. The lunatic fringe makes for amusing TV in some what the same way as they enjoy watching “realtiy TV” an oxymoron if there ever was one. Hopefully the mainstream of America will not swallow the “why bother” attitude being peddled by the right-wing media.
Once again, for those who don’t come here often enough to know the players, CoRev tends to mount up with Buffy and sammy, and to trot around spewing stuff picked up from Beck and his like. “Just the propaganda, ma’am. We’re the bagger police.” Facts are used when handy, otherwise condemned as a liberal trick. CoRev has settled on “angry” for me as a way to keep from having to deal with the substance of my arguments, in much the same way his fellow travelers have settled on birth certificate/muslim/Hitler/socialist to deal with Obama. You know, when you don’t have the facts, try something else…
If you want anger, go back through the older postings here and see how CoRev responded when called out for dishonesty and warped logic. It was pretty sad. CoRev nowadays sticks to his talking points – it’s what they teach at that political boot camp he attended – so you won’t see him deviate now from “angry”. No matter how correct or well reasoned my points may be, CoRev will say “angry”. He isn’t in the room with me, doesn’t know me personally, so cannot know my emotional state. Which is to say, he’s lying to serve an agenda. But then, it is the exception when he isn’t.
Jack,
I know at least 8 people who went to the Stewart/Colbert ralley and they all will be voting straight R ticket. They went to have a laugh and like both shows (as do I). Your making a unwarrented assumption that they were all D voters. I think, with no backing at all, that the Beck crowd was a little more anti-incumbant…
Islam will change
None up here in Canada. Maybe I just lucked out.
Kharris,
What exactly did I say that did not conform to reality? I’ll give you the 10% unemployment – its really 9.7%. So what else you got?
Nothing as usual, all ad hominum.
Islam will change
Kharris,
You far left wing ideology is going to get crushed at the polls and be set aside, hopefully forever this time.
You call us angry? We are celebrating (hopefully) that the american people will brings us back to divided government and get this country back on track and get government focused on jobs, jobs, jobs.
Not on seeing how big we can expand the Federal government and increase the Feds control of every aspect of our lives…but you really don’t understand it do you? That people want the Feds out of their lives? That this election is a referendum on Dem leadership in general and Pres. Obama in paticular?
We will see by tommorrow what the people actually want!
Islam will change
Kharris,
You far left wing ideology is going to get crushed at the polls and be set aside, hopefully forever this time.
You call us angry? We are celebrating (hopefully) that the american people will brings us back to divided government and get this country back on track and get government focused on jobs, jobs, jobs.
Not on seeing how big we can expand the Federal government and increase the Feds control of every aspect of our lives…but you really don’t understand it do you? That people want the Feds out of their lives? That this election is a referendum on Dem leadership in general and Pres. Obama in paticular?
We will see by tommorrow what the people actually want!
Islam will change
buff,
Just a follow up query , to a typical tea parter.
What about “your[r] far left wing ideology”, you have always worked in a taxpayer funded environment between your 20 odd year career in the USaf and your current revolving door job in the military industrial complex jobs program.
You have never worked any here that was not a socialized jobs program.
The nearest thing kharris has to the kind of cash flow from the taxpayer you have enjoyed your entire life is SS.
ilsm will not chnage
The lunatic fringe also makes for amusing blog commets as well!
The fictional “far left” agenda never started, so of course will not continue in 2011 regardless of the results today. The only ‘left’ thing which has happened over the past 30 years is the expansion of gay rights.
I’m looking forward to the political theater provided by Speaker Boehner and his Patriot Avengers. I’ll be sorely disappointed if it doesn’t include at least one government shut down, a failure to raise the debt ceiling (leading to market jitters about US “default”) and a vote to impeach President Obama. Anything less would be a ratings killer, eliciting unfavorable comparison between Speaker Boehner and his illustrious predecessor in bomb-throwing, Speaker Gingrich. (Even then, nobody will be interested in Newtie’s gnawing hunger for the 2012 presidential nomination.)
Also, for good measure, we need to see The Orange Man do at least one of his patented tearful speeches from the well of the House. Probably something about the damage done to the delicate sensibilities of hedge fund managers by all the ‘uncertainty’ in tax policy. Followed promptly by expiration of unemployment benefits for millions of ‘baggers and a vote to bring back insurance companies’ sacred right to bar coverage of pre-existing conditions.
Anecdotal admittedly. I live in a fairly democratic area and we have contested U.S. Senate and Governor’s races. All the folks who had the McCain Palin yard signs up 2 years ago, have yard signs up supporting the GOP candidates, but only a handful of the folks who had Obama Biden signs up have signs supporting the Dems. There is the polling data which suggests that the GOP does much better with likely voters than registered voters. Finally it is my premise that in terms of voter turnout, that liberal/progressive folks rarely turnout. Four years ago all the polls showed that the incumbent Democratic governor held a very slim lead going into the election. The GOP had orchestrated a ballot initiative on a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage to be voted on at the gubernatorial election with the thought it would energize the base and bump off the incumbent Democrat. The strategy backfired. The liberals got fired up to try and vote down the gay marriage ban–they were unsuccessful–and after bothering to drag themsleves to the polls voted for the Democrats and the governor was re-elected by double digits. Sort of the same thing happened in 2008 with Obama’s “Hope and Change”. He polled about 6% higher than Gore or Kerry statewide. The bloom is off that rose, there is simply no candidate or issue to get the left off its rear ends and while the Dems outnumber the GOP when you count the left wing of the party, without the left wing the GOP prevails. Finally, a big chunk of the Democrats in the urban area are people of color and there has been no interest in the election expressed by their leaders and in fact no real effort by the major candidates to get their vote–all of the rallies have been in the lilly white parts of the state.
Maybe that’s just what the country needs to try to slap it out of the delirium that it sometimes experiences. But it would be painful to the rest of us. Boehner and McConnell in charge in the Congress. Two less capable people would be hard to find. What’s Bobby Jindal doing lately? Can the Congress declare war without the President’s cooperation? The Republic of RepubliCorps is likely to find some enemy to toss a few bombs at. A more strenuous war effort sometimes works to get the cob webs out of the economy. When does military conscription start up again? The highway system may finally get the attention it needs with Bechtel and KBR probably looking for more work to do and the best Republican stimulus is one aimed at corporate Amerika.
But McConnell has already said that he intends to do nothing other than work toward a failed Obama administration. I suppose it hadn’t occured to him that that would mean a continuing failure of everyday life for the American people. I’m sure he must be making plans for good jobs for his friends and family. Isn’t that the process with well placed government officials? There may be change ahead after all, but not the change that we had hoped for or believed in. Will the Big O then continue to fawn over the concepts of conciliation and compromise? We’re all in it toghether, are we not? Or are they all in it for themselves?
Beyond unwarranted assumptions, this is from The Hill: According to the poll conducted by Lake Research Partners & Revolution Messaging at the “Rally to Restore Sanity,” 86 percent of participants surveyed said they planned to vote Democratic this week, with eight percent undecided and just one percent voting Republican.
I think this poll understates Republican attendance, possibly by a factor of 5 or 10! But the crowd was generally young and moderate-to-left (or apolitical) so the polling surely is correct that D voters greatly outnumbered R voters. Oh, FWIW, both of those crowd estimates probably are low, by 25 to 50 percent, from what evidence I have seen; also, it was obvious that tens of thousands tried to attend the Stewart/Colbert rally but ended up at home or at bars/restaurants/other.
Still, this says little about the electorate as a whole. (Tongue entering cheek here.) Unemployment is the key factor, right? For example, I’m sure the 9.6 percent unemployment today will explain Dem losses in the Senate at least as fully as the 10.8 percent unemployment explained Rep losses in the Senate in that year (when they went from 54 seats to, uh, 54 seats).
It’s election night and none of the main posters can put up an open thread. What’s up with that?
I go away to watch my poll, and there’s KH making my point (his anger, and repetitive hit and run personal attacks…). Thanks for your confirmation, KH!
BTW, when you make points for which I have an interst and/or knowledge, I respond, but way too often they are like your above pointless comment.
I would be interested in the actual point in your comment. Please define it for us.
I go away to watch my poll, and there’s KH making my point (his anger, and repetitive hit and run personal attacks…). Thanks for your confirmation, KH!
BTW, when you make points for which I have an interest and/or knowledge, I respond, but way too often they are like your above pointless comment.
If there was an actual point in your comment, please define it for us.