*Emerson is a joke*

[DemocratSinceBirth]

I welcome all Stats and Poli Sci majors to tell me if these findings are remotely tethered to reality:

Link to tweet

The suggestion that Trump is winning by 1 in urban areas and losing by 20 in suburban areas is risible. That's just not how people vote, ever. The Democrats do much better in urban areas and less well in suburban areas, not vice versa. That's a finding that's been consistent for decades.

More on Emerson:

Link to tweet

Beware of Emerson with it's IVR/MTurk frame despite it's A- rating. It's garbage methodology.


Focus on the average. If a poll looks too good or bad to be true it probably is.

[beachbumbob]

1. not worth the effort to care about emerson polling

[Demsrule86]

2. This is a poll that began in a college. I question their methods and believe they got lucky in 16.

I believe it is seriously flawed and ignored.

[Johnny2X2X]

3. It's 1 data point

Emerson is a well regarded poll, A-, but it doesn't mean they can't get it wrong from time to time. This one seems really odd. But just take it as a data point, same as a single poll showing Biden up 10.

[bearsfootball516]

5. Emerson changed it's methodology right after it got its A- rating.

They changed to MTurk, a notoriously bad polling methodology. But 538 only updates it's ratings every couple years, so it's stuck with the A- rating despite being a significantly worse polling firm since changing it's methodology.

[Thekaspervote]

8. FYI: Emerson was graded c- by 538, upgraded it recently to a- despite no good changes to their

Flawed polling methodology

The Economist pollster will not even put them in their averaging mix

Silver is still trying to recover from the ridiculous polling he did for the dem primaries. After 2 caucus nights silver declares that sanders will win 49 states despite the fact that the statistics showed sanders vote totals were down 25% from 16 and there was no youth voter turn out. Declared Biden’s campaign to be dead.

[Amishman]

4. IF they do this poll after poll, then the methodology is garbage

This looks more like a total fluke of a sample. It happens even to good pollsters.

Random sampling is random, and will sometimes spit out a complete head scratcher. An honest pollster can't just toss it because they doubt it or dislike it. They report it and move on.

[Codeine]

6. Even with good methodology

you can get an occasional wonky result. It’s one poll, with the rest of the polling industry coming up with differing results. Not a big deal, and not worth the gloom and doom.

[uponit7771]

7. K, Trump is up a half point in urban areas? Really ?! This is horrible, but 538 will take them ...

... seriously even though their 16 swing state polling a week and 3 days out were horrible.

[BGBD]

9. MTURK

Shouldn't be used.

It's a lot cheaper to just pay a bunch of random people a few cents to take a poll than try to call the number of people it takes to get a good sample.....however, they are also unreliable.

Many of them just click through these polls so that they can complete as many as possible in the lease amount of time. They are doing it for money, and they want to maximize their earnings. It's a quantity game, not a quality game on MTURK.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

10. Live caller polls are a lot more expensive

https://www.pewresearch.org/methods/2020/02/18/assessing-the-risks-to-online-polls-from-bogus-respondents/

[BGBD]

11. you get

what you pay for.