Saturday Morning Data Dump – 9/6

[phrigndumass]

This batch of data doesn’t seem to fit in the Daily Widget or THE MATH Weekly threads, but it is interesting nonetheless. So I thought I’d start a weekly (or whenever the mood strikes me) thread about the gender, age and ethnicity crosstabs from the polls.

These are for the national picture, or the popular vote. I have it all broken down by state as well. Call me curious.

The Overall Popular Vote total from the State polls shows Obama leading McCain by 0.7%, or 48.4% to 47.7% (see the blue widget at the top of this post). But when we look at the state poll crosstabs for gender, the popular vote changes to a lead of 1.6% for Obama. The state poll crosstabs for age show a lead of 1.7% for Obama, and the state poll crosstabs for ethnicity put Obama’s lead at 2.9% nationwide.

The reason these demographic percentages change? Simple … we are projecting an increase in voter turnout this year for young people, females, African-Americans and Latinos. The pollsters haven’t worked these demographic increases into their polling methodology yet, but they will (hopefully) when voter registration deadlines have passed next month.


GENDER CROSSTABS


Some people claim women are indecisive. You might believe it’s the other way around by looking at the gender graphs below. Females have steadily supported Obama over McCain this year, while males have been a bit wishy-washy, going back and forth between the two. Males are currently trending towards Obama, though.











ETHNICITY CROSSTABS


The Hispanic vote seems to be changing drastically, or there might be an outlier in our midst. We’ll have to wait and see. Meanwhile, fewer white voters are currently supporting McCain. The African-American vote is steadfast for Obama.














AGE CROSSTABS


Young voters seem to be dipping towards McCain, but as there has been a state poll drought lately, this could easily change. The largest age demographic expected to vote this year is the 45 to 64 range, and they seem to be increasingly supporting Obama at this point.






































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[fight4my3sons]

1. Hey! Good morning!

You, curious? :) Don't know anyone around here like that.

I'm going to look at the data dump now...

:hi:

[phrigndumass]

3. I needed a way to say Good Morning to you on Saturdays :)

So ... :donut: Good morning! :hi: :hi:

[fight4my3sons]

5. What is going on with the 30-34 age group?!

That one is surprising to me. Am I reading it wrong? Maybe I don't have enough coffee? The LOUD playing that is going on behind me...

[phrigndumass]

7. That age group may be more "Palin-friendly"

We'll have to wait and see how that age group shakes out, I guess.

Where are your ear plugs? With three young boys, you should keep those suckers within reach! :D

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. Thanks for the hard work

it is quite impressive. I wouldn't count out the +75 crowd going for Obama, though. My mom, who has been a Republican most of her life, is solidly for Obama, and this came about after watching both conventions. She'll be 90 by the time she can vote--and you can bet your boots that she will vote.

[phrigndumass]

Your mother makes us proud!

The wisdom of the age-enhanced should never be discounted.

:donut: Good morning! :hi:

[ps1074]

4. Can you please explain that to me?

Every poll I've seen gives Obama at least 60% of the hispanic vote, yet these curves show McCain pulling even... Thanks.

[phrigndumass]

6. It must be an outlier ...

That slice of data came from the Economist/YouGov national poll. They showed McCain leading among Latino voters by 4 points. I just took a look at the last Economist/YouGov national poll from a couple weeks ago, and it had Obama leading by 20 points among Latino voters. It would be unrealistic to think that a certain demographic of voters could swing 24 points in two weeks.

http://media.economist.com/media//econ01sep2008_tabs.pdf

The poll showed Obama leading overall nationwide by 3 points, so his lead in that poll is actually greater than 3 points because of the bad data on Latino voters.

Good morning! :hi:

[CitizenLeft]

20. thank you for explaining that... it worried me too.

I couldn't understand what had happened to make Hispanic support take a nosedive. Phew!

[phrigndumass]

22. yw

:hi:

[Muttocracy]

8. that curve is being pulled very heavily by that single early September point

Maybe phrigndumass can tell us more about that particular point. Third-order curves (compared to a general straight-line fit) are going to be misleading if there's a region on the graph without a lot of data points and a small data set overall (i.e., I don't think McCain is suddenly skyrocketing).

on edit - phrig answered while I was s l o w l y typing :)

[phrigndumass]

9. Yours was a good analysis of that graph, regardless of typing speed :)

:donut: Good morning! :hi:

[Faygo Kid]

10. What's with the Hispanic vote surge for McCain? That's unexpected.

Don't get that one at all.

[phrigndumass]

11. Yup, have a look at Reply #6 above ... must be an outlier.

Good morning! :hi:

[BumRushDaShow]

12. You are a doll for continually providing such enlightening information!

:applause:

[phrigndumass]

13. Aw thanks!

Gawd, both Palin and I are dolls. I hope there's nothing else in common ... :D

:donut: Good morning! :hi:

[Time for change]

14. Very interesting, thank you

So, where are you getting your numbers from? I thought Obama was doing better than that, as indicated here:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/polls/

[phrigndumass]

17. yw ... The data in the blue chart comes from the state poll crosstabs

There has been a drought on state polls lately because of the conventions, so those numbers will catch up, hopefully. The data in the graphs are derived from the national poll crosstabs (but not the daily trackers).

I track the popular vote totals from the state polls. It's a sum of each candidate's take in each state based on the latest state polls:





As you can see from the graph below, the state poll totals (green) are lagging behind the daily trackers and Real Clear Politics average due to the drought on state polls:





:hi:

[Time for change]

31. Wouldn't the state polls always be behind by quite a bit?

It seems that some states haven't been polled in months.

:hi:

[Ichingcarpenter]

15. You have always had great poll data posts! The 55-59 age group

is extremely encouraging, as is the 44-49 age group.

Both of those show upward curves for Obama and is a critical voting group.


The youth vote data is surprising.

[phrigndumass]

18. I believe Biden really helped with "age-enhanced" folks

Or it could be a mix of Biden positives and Palin negatives helping Obama's numbers lately among older people.

:hi:

[faithfulcitizen]

16. Awesome! Few things that stuck out: Down w/Hispanics, Way up w/45-65 y.o, & McCain is only up w/65+.

Wonder what happened with hispanics since 7/31? Did Biden help us with 45-65 year olds? And right now McCain is only ahead with people over 65! wow..

[phrigndumass]

19. Have a quick look at Reply #6 above about the Hispanic vote :)

It appears to be an outlier.

Most of the positives from the graphs are due to Obama's convention bounce, since most of the national polls were conducted last weekend and early this week. It's nice to know that Obama has the ability to pull these numbers, though! I believe Biden helped.

:hi:

[underpants]

21. Excellent work

thanks

[phrigndumass]

23. Thanks underpants

:hi:

[hootinholler]

24. What the heck is a cross tab anyway?

Got a polling for poets primer?

-Hoot

[phrigndumass]

25. It's a one-calorie drink for fundie whackjobs

Or ... a subgroup's polling numbers.

A pollster will show a "topline" result, or the percentages that each candidate received in a poll. But below that, they break it down by demographic group for each candidate (gender, age, ethnicity). Those breakdowns are called crosstabs.

I considered making that rhyme for you, but my head would explode :D

:hi:

[Snarkoleptic]

26. k&r thanx Phrigster!

[phrigndumass]

27. yw Snark

Thanks! :hi:

[tekisui]

28. Interesting stuff there.

It appears the Post-Convention bumps came from males, and ages 45-64 for Obama.

And, from 30-39 year olds for mccain. Maybe these are the fundies that were not support mccain, yet?

That is great news for Obama, though. The more he can push into the older demographics, the better.

[grantcart]

29. The running discussion going back to the last couple of months is

that the polls in various states when added together showed a much greater lead by Obama than that of the national polls.

We then looked at weighting and it is clear that on the basis of weighting solely on race that the national polls are underreporting Obama's numbers by 3%.

Now USA Today's polls show what your graphs are showing that Obama has sizeable leads in every age group except for the 65+ where McCain holds a 3% lead.

There is no way to reconcile the age demographic trends with the national poll results. Either we are in a race that is tied and every other indicator is wrong or everyother indicator is right and the national polls are wrong.

[Demeter]

30. I Could Call You "Curious", But P-Man is Much Easier to Spell

and type.

I'm thinking of changing TGIF to DGIF--Dear God It's Friday! Between the FDIC seizures, the Credit Union capers, the plunging markets and the Fannie and Freddie sagas, we over at the Stock Market Watch and it's wholly owned subsidiary: The Weekend Economist, are getting a bit phobic when the week ends.

I think the national polls are 1) fundamentally flawed 2) lying in their teeth so as to fool the gullible people into voting for McCain. I think they've always been that way.

The rabid Republicanism of the convention was quite scary--for sane people. How long before we can see the effects of that?