American Opinion Polls are Rigged..............Nah But They are Wrong

With a week to go before the US Presidential elections, Real Clear Politics poll of polls has Clinton leading Trump by 2.2%. But scratch the surface and you see that the margin is depleting. In the last 5 polls published 4 are within the margin of error meaning technically they are a “dead heat”.

Here is the thing, I think the opinion polls are going to be proven wrong. Either Clinton will win by a big margin i.e well above 5% or Trump will win. Either way it wont be “too close to call”.

Here are five reasons why the polls will be proven wrong

1. Opinion polls have proven unreliable around the world – The polls got it all wrong in the elections in the UK, in Israel and just last week in Iceland. In Iceland, the anti establishment Pirate party was predicted to win but it did’nt. If you are looking for alternatives as a signpost here are two

(a) The UK bookies correctly predicted BREXIT. Currently at Ladbrokes, the split of bets is 80-20 in favour of a Trump Win.  

(b) In line with the opinion polls, the search for “move to Canada” which peaked when Trump won the primaries has surged in the past 7 days. Similarly, the search for the two candidates is now in a tie.

2.  American Polls are faulty to start with – The sample sizes of the polls hover around 1100. A poll of that size will surely struggle to represent the diversity of the US. Indeed the New York Times correctly pointed out how one 19 year old black man in Illinois was skewing the poll results. Essentially his demographic is  under represented in the panel and hence his voting intention (to vote for Trump) was upweighted significantly !!! Does it reflect the thinking of all of his demographic?

3. People lie to pollsters – That’s unfair to people who take the time to answer questions in a survey but it fair to say that when answering a human being “political correctness” plays a role. The polls conducted over telephone (Clinton winning) have a different response to those conducted online (Trump winning). Political correctness would explain the difference in the two polls. Remember on election day its just “you and your ballot in complete anonymity”. What role will political correctness play on the 8^th of November is something polls cant factor in.

4. Will they vote? – One problem that all pollsters wrestle with it is determining who will actually show up on election day. Will the Clinton supporters come out in droves now that “its not a done deal”. Will the independents who would otherwise have voted for Clinton stay at home? The outcome of the election could well nigh depend on the voter turnout and how this splits across demographics. 

5. Mood of the electorate” – You would expect voting to be a rational decision but since it is human beings casting their ballots emotions do play a huge role. It has been proven that the “mood of the electorate” can impact the outcome of the elections. Things like sporting events could impact this “mood”. With the rise of the social media we live in a “there are no lies, it’s a matter of perspective” world. So it is quite likely that the mood will be impacted by “news” or even “meme-able” headlines. Will there be more emails or Russian connection between now and next Tuesday?

Why Roy Hodgson will determine the outcome of BREXIT

Why Roy Hodgson will determine the outcome of Brexit. And why all opinion polls should be ignored.

Living in the UK, one cannot but follow the “BREXIT” debate with fascination. Both sides of the debate strongly put forth arguments around why the economy will be better off under their version of the future. So listening to the remain camp I am led to believe that the economy would thrive staying within the EU. Listening to the leave camp leads me to be believe that the economy would thrive by leaving the EU. Of course all arguments are backed by “statistics”. Reminds me of what Mark Twain once said “there are lies, there are damm lies and there are statistics”. 

It seems like it will impact everything – the economy, employment rates, immigration, the value of home prices, possibility of war and indeed the future of curry houses. The only thing that the outcome wont impact seems to be the chances of finding a vaccine for AIDS.  Thankfully, I don’t have the right to vote on the topic. I would find it impossible to arrive at a rational decision based on the “facts” being put forth by both sides.

I don’t find it surprising that this reflects in the split opinion among the electorate. While the latest opinion poll on Brexit shows “remain” to be ahead, I would interpret it as being a “dead heat”.  Indeed, looking back at the response to the question from 2013 shows remain and leave almost equally matched with a large proportion of population being “undecided”.

Source : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_United_Kingdom_European_Union_membership_referendum

Of Sportsmen and Gladiators

Sporting events are known to be associated with immense passion and ones involving national teams invariably raise the levels of nationalistic pride. Witness the euphoria surrounding the performance of Team GB at the London 2012 Olympics.

Andrew Healey from Loyola Marymount University showed that sports results can swing the outcome of elections. He showed that a win for the local college football team within 10 days of the election positively impacted the chances of the incumbent. The impact was stronger if the team had a strong fan base and were the underdogs.

Why is this relevant to Brexit? English voters account for almost 80% of the total voting population. The next largest block are the Scots (~10%) and they seem to be firmly in the remain camp (58% remain vs. 19% leave). So the English voters are likely to make the most difference.

With 3 days to go to the referendum, England play their last game of the league stage of Euro 2016. England have a large fan base and are clearly underdogs – a win would uplift the spirit of the nation and propel the remain campain forward.  Equally failing to reach the next stage, particularly on account of Wales (also in the same group) would be a dampener on the spirit of the nation and propel the leave campaign forward.

Is any opinion poll accounting for this? No. Well so how accurate are they going to be???

“The economy, stupid” – Campaign slogan of Bill Clinton

A recent ComRes telephone poll for The Daily Mail and ITV News shows that the economy is the largest factor influencing voters. It was for the first time that the economy was cited ahead of migration.

I can empathise with that given all the discussion around the potential impact on the prices of houses. Again depending on whom you listen to it could impact house prices negatively by upto 18% and mortgage rates would rise (Remain camp) or have no impact at all (Leave campaign). The more evocative topic is around jobs and business prospects. The debate was exemplified when the fate of curry houses was dragged into the debate!!!

Economists have studied approval ratings for the European project against the monthly unemployment rates. They found that when unemployment is rising approval of the membership goes down. Hardly surprising I would say. The correlation is more intuitive than the one between divorce rates in Maine and the per capital consumption of Margarine. (Source - http://tylervigen.com/spurious-correlations).

Here is the thing – the next tranche of employment data is due to be published on the 15^th of June. With 8 days to go before a major referendum we will have new information that will swing opinions of the electorate in general and the “14% undecided” in particular.

Is any opinion poll accounting for this? No. Well so how accurate are they going to be???

“In everything one thing is impossible : rationality” – Friedrich Nietzsche 

As human beings we are far less rational than we would like to think we are. Indeed as Robert A. Heinlein said “Man is not a rational animal, he is a rationalising animal”. Behaviour of human beings while voting is no different. Voting decisions are not based on a rational and objective reasoning despite their importance to the functioning of a democracy. Like with a lot of our other decisions, its all about emotions.

The outcome of Brexit will be determined by emotions. The feel good factor of either England, the quintessential underdogs, progressing to the next round or good employment figures would lead to a vote to remain. None of the opinion polls are factoring in emotional sentiments. Hence, they are at best “broad indicators”. The current “broad indication” is that it will be a close race – a conclusion I could reach by reading the newspapers and tuning into the radio.