Don't you have to account for their margin of error though?
I don't see them on your link. But usually when a poll says 45% there's a spread in both directions indicating the level uncertainty in their data.
So for example a pollster could find that 45% of people prefer X over Y with a +/-5 point margin of error. Meaning it could be 50% prefer X over Y or 40% given our model
Frequently I've seen something like 2-3% margin of error either way. So with your numbers Florida for example could only be off 1% given the margin of error. I dunno what the margin of error was though.
Remember polls are best guess statistical models. There is a lot of jitter in human modeling. Not least of which is due to the simple fact that people lie. We lie a lot to fit in versus be honest. and we encourage this feeling in people. There's no realistic way I can see for pollsters to account for that
I don't see them on your link. But usually when a poll says 45% there's a spread in both directions indicating the level uncertainty in their data.
So for example a pollster could find that 45% of people prefer X over Y with a +/-5 point margin of error. Meaning it could be 50% prefer X over Y or 40% given our model
Frequently I've seen something like 2-3% margin of error either way. So with your numbers Florida for example could only be off 1% given the margin of error. I dunno what the margin of error was though.
Remember polls are best guess statistical models. There is a lot of jitter in human modeling. Not least of which is due to the simple fact that people lie. We lie a lot to fit in versus be honest. and we encourage this feeling in people. There's no realistic way I can see for pollsters to account for that