How The Downballot reports on and analyzes polls
How The Downballot reports on and analyzes polls Polling can be very useful, but we have strict requirements for what we will—and won’t—include David Nir Sep 8 From our earliest days more than two decades ago, election polls have always been of interest to us at The Downballot, since they can tell us a great deal about a given race and the electorate at large. But they also have their limitations, which is why we have strict requirements before we include a poll in our coverage. These are requirements we’ve adhered to for a long time and have written about before . The world of polling has changed a good deal since the last time we visited the topic in depth, though, so we felt an update was warranted. Below, we discuss each of our requirements, as well as other factors we take into account to best derive meaning from survey data. Requirements Pollster name Most pollsters have reputations, some good and some bad. Without knowing who conducted a poll, we have no way to place it in the c...
