Sunday!!! 9 days to go! My daily home stretch election polling update

[NRaleighLiberal]

Last edited Sun Oct 25, 2020, 11:31 PM - Edit history (10)

Ah, up early, Sunday Times (I love the Puzzle in the mag - finished it in an hour, but the ken ken and a few other of the puzzles are kicking my ass). Figured I'd do this now, after cleaning our basement but before making a pumpkin loaf. I'll refresh/update the numbers before I go to bed.

538 - https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-election-forecast/

Oct 12 - Joe 86/100 chance of winning, 346 EVs, 53.5% of popular vote.
Oct 13 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 346 EVs. 53.5% popular vote
Oct 14 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 346 EVs, 53.5% of popular vote
Oct 15 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 346 EVs, 53.5% of the popular vote
Oct 16 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 346 EVs. 53.5% of the popular vote
Oct 17 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 347 EVs, 53.6% of the popular vote
Oct 18 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 347 EVs, 53.6% of the popular vote
Oct 19 - Joe 88/100 chance of winning, 348 EVs, 53.6% of popular vote.
Oct 20 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 346 EVs, 53.5% of the popular vote.
Oct 21 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 345 EVs, 53.4% of the popular vote
Oct 22 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 347 EVs, 53.5% of the popular vote.
Oct 23 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 346 EVs, 53.4% of the popular vote.
Oct 24 - Joe 86/100 chance of winning, 343 EVs, 53.3% of the popular vote.
today - Oct 25 - Joe 87/100 chance of winning, 345 EVs, 53.3% of the popular vote.

Essentially rock steady for 14 days

Another important number - Trump approve today is 42.6, disapprove 53.6 - an 11 gap. (I know...how can that many approve???)

Sam Wang Princeton - https://election.princeton.edu/

Oct 12 - Joe metamargin +6.3, estimate 369 EVs.
Oct 13 - Joe metamargin +5.9, est 359 EVs
Oct 14 - Joe metamargin +6.0, est 358 EVs
Oct 15 - Joe metamargin +6.1, est 357 EVs
Oct 16 - Joe metamargin +5.9, est 351 EVs
Oct 17 - Joe metamargin +5.9, est 353 EVs
Oct 18 - Joe metamargin +5.8, est 356 EVs
Oct 19 - Joe metamargin +5.7, est 351 EVs
Oct 20 - Joe metamargin +5.4, est 356 EVs
Oct 21 - Joe metamargin +5.4, est 357 EVs
Oct 22 - Joe metamargin +5.6, est 362 EVs
Oct 23 - Joe metamagin +5.5, est 358 EVs
Oct 24 - Joe metamargin +5.5, est 357 EVs
today - Oct 25 - Joe metamargin +5.4, 360 EVs

pretty steady for 14 days, tiny bit of improving, even, from the tiny dip. "it's getting better all the time", as the Beatles say!

The Economist - https://projects.economist.com/us-2020-forecast/president

Oct 12 - Joe 91/100 chance of winning, 345 EVs, currently at 54.2% of popular vote
Oct 13 - Joe 91/100 chance of winning, 343 EVs, currently at 54.3% of popular vote.
Oct 14 - Joe 91/100 chance of winning, 343 EVs, 54.3% of popular vote
Oct 15 - Joe 91/100 chance of winning, 343 EVs, 54% of popular vote.
Oct 16 - Joe 91/100 chance of winning, 341 EVs, 54.3% of the popular vote.
Oct 17 - Joe 91/100 chance of winning, 341 EVs, 54.3% of the popular vote
Oct 18 - Joe 91/100 chance of winning, 341 EVs, 54.3% of the popular vote
Oct 19 - Joe 92/100 chance of winning, 350 EVs, 54.2% of the popular vote
Oct 20 - Joe 93/100 chance of winning, 350 EVs, 54.3% of the popular vote
Oct 21 - Joe 92/100 chance of winning, 350 EVs, 54.2% of the popular vote
Oct 22 - Joe 92/100 chance of winning, 345 EVs, 54% of the popular vote
Oct 23 - Joe 92/100 chance of winning, 343 EVs, 54.1% of the popular vote
Oct 24 - Joe 91/100 chance of winning, 340 EVs, 53.9% of the popular vote
today - Oct 25 - Joe 94/100 chance of winning, 350 EVs, 54.5% of the popular vote

election day estimate Joe 54.3%

and, again, quite steady over the last 14 days, with a nice kick up tonight.

For the 14th day in a row, no significant sign at all of race tightening; in fact, teeny signs of improvement. Enjoy the rest of your Sunday!

The current electoral vote totals from the three sites are 345, 360 and 350. Very consistent.

Bonus addition - where the election was in 2016 on 538 https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/

9 days before the election in 2016 was Oct 31. Hillary was at 71% chance, 312 EVs, 49 to 44 percent popular vote, 5 point separation - and this was 3 days after the Comey letter surfaced - her numbers were starting to drop. Joe has 33 more EVs, 16 percent higher chance, and 53 vs 49 percent popular vote - 4 point separation, with Joe well over 50. The Comey letter impact became worse - Joe's numbers are higher, and much more steady.

then...tomorrow and until election day - vote! help the campaign - phone bank - do whatever! Energize!

[SheltieLover]

1. K&R!

Ty!

[Walleye]

2. And all of their October surprises so far have fizzled

Rudy’s humiliation was the icing on the cake

[musclecar6]

3. It does look positive

But with that said, it will still be a fight to the finish. Hard to believe there are still so many stupid people voting for that national disgrace.

[NRaleighLiberal]

4. yes, it needs to be a really busy last 9 days to ensure ALL Dems vote!!!

[klook]

5. Thanks for putting this together. These numbers are extremely encouraging for us:

According to the least sanguine of the three, The Economist, Biden's chances of winning several key states are:
Pennsylvania - 88% (20 Electoral Votes)
Michigan - 93% (16 EVs)
Wisconsin - 91% (10 EVs)

With those three, plus all the Hillary 2016 states, Biden wins 278-260.

Personally, I don't see how Biden wins states like North Carolina (15 EVs - 65% chance of a Biden win), Arizona (11 EVs - 65%), or Florida (29 EVs - 74%) and loses one or more of the big three battlegrounds listed above. But I guess crazy things are possible, especially this election. So we can game out various scenarios, but almost all of them look very favorable for Dems.

If things go very well for us, we could be talking about winning all three of those additional three states, which results in a 333-205 blowout and probably the winner announced on election night, which would shut down the Republican election-stealing machine cold and be a thorough repudiation of Trumpism.

If we want to dream big -- and, after a second cup of coffee and a chocolate croissant, I'm willing to go there -- if Biden were to prevail in Georgia (16 EVs - 44% chance of a Biden win), Iowa (6 EVs - 38%), Ohio (18 EVs - 30%), and Texas (38 EVs - 27%), It's a 411-127 obliteration of the Trumplican Party.

OK, sugar-and-caffeine buzz is wearing off a little. I guess that truly is crazy. But I have to say, with 9 days to go, those of us who've been on the ledge for a while now and have carpal tunnel from all the hand-wringing really should come back in the window, wipe the pigeon poop off our shoes, take a deep breath, and have a nice cup of chamomile tea.

Note: The Economist is updating its forecast regularly (I even had to change some numbers while typing this), so the odds listed above may no longer be current by the time people read this post.

[NRaleighLiberal]

6. excellent response to my post - thanks. And I actually update my OPs regularly throughout

the day and evening (except between midnight and my next post, of course!)

Coffee and a chocolate croissant - we have the same taste!

[Marius25]

7. It's still depressing that Biden isn't getting 80%

of the popular vote.

[NRaleighLiberal]

8. Highest popular vote totals (above 60%) are...

Nixon 1972 60.7
Johnson 1964 61
FDR 1936 60.8
Harding 1920 60.3
Monroe 1820 80.6
Monroe 1816 68.2
Madison 1808 64.7
Jefferson 1804 72.8
Jefferson 1800 61.4
Washington 1788 and 1792 100

So Biden at 80 percent would put him in a very different time!

Then again, no one has ever had to run against a monster failure incumbent like trump!

[regnaD kciN]

10. It should be noted that Washington's 100%...

...was in the days before party politics, when people voted for electors rather than candidates who had their own slate of them.

[NRaleighLiberal]

11. indeed! it was amusing to see those 100 percents!!!

[sfstaxprep]

12. Given The # Of Insane Cult Members Out There....

I think 57% is probably the high water mark. Most likely Biden will end up with around 55%.

[NRaleighLiberal]

9. kick

[regnaD kciN]

13. One caveat: "steady" at 538 doesn't mean what you think...

538 has an “uncertainty factor” built into their algorithm, to account for the possibility of an unforeseen event turning the campaign on its ear, which speaks to the possibility that such an event could propel the losing candidate to victory. Thus, it dials back the leading candidate’s odds. However, it decreases every day we get closer to the election, since there’s less chance for such an event to have an impact.

What this works out to is that, in a truly steady race, the uncertainty factor would be weighted less, and drag down Biden’s odds less every day, which would mean that his odds of winning should go up daily in a steady race. As the folks there put it just after the debates, if the race remained steady, you’d see Biden’s “win percentage” grow every day, and finally hit something like 93% by Election Day. The fact that this hasn’t happened over the past few days testifies to the race actually narrowing slightly. This is really not that surprising, as 538’s poll averages have recently had a larger margin than other analysis sites. (They had it at over 10% last week, and a bit over 9% now, whereas the Economist’s site kept the margin between 7% and 8%.) Thus, some tightening with their model was scarcely surprising – the only question would be, over the next ten days, whether it would drastically narrow to the 5% or less where Trump would have a good chance at winning another EV/PV split. I’d say it looks doubtful from the trend lines, but I’m no expert.

[NRaleighLiberal]

14. You are correct - my use of "steady" is that the numbers haven't really budged.

So I am using the term very simplistically.

[Dem2]

15. You slipped a "3" near the end

I think it should read "Joe has 33 more EVs, 16 percent higher chance, and 53 vs 49 percent popular vote ..."

[NRaleighLiberal]

16. thanks! lots of editing throughout the day and big fingers/thumbs!!!

fixed!

anyone else finds errors, please let me know.

[Dem2]

17. We just gained 30 EVs

lol