Don’t Trust the Election Forecasts

Justin Grimmer: “Statistical models that aggregate polling data and use it to estimate the probability of each candidate winning an election have become extremely popular in recent years. Proponents claim they provide an unbiased projection of what will happen in November and serve as antidotes to the ad hoc predictions of talking-head political pundits. And of course, we all want to know who is going to win.”

“But the reality is there’s far less precision and far more punditry than forecasters admit.”