| Bofferbrauer2 said: Great post! Just wanted to add this 538 page which tracks and charts the approval/disapproval rating of a president over his/her entire tenure. As such, rather than just have some specific points in time, there's a graph with all the ups and down - though truth been told, Biden's approval has been surprisingly stable so far and just the disapproval has risen out of the formerly undecided: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/biden-approval-rating/ And just for comparison, here's Trump's old chart: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-ratings/ |
Thanks!
I wish RCP did that kind of tracking over time. It'd make things easier for me 'cause I've come to trust their averages slightly more than Nate Silver's. Compared to election results, it seems like 538 tends to overestimate Democratic support more by excluding Republican-leaning polls like the Rasmussen ones because he's a liberal and thus concludes that conservative pollsters are often incredulous and not worth including in his averaging. The final tabulations on 538 on election day predicted an 8-point Biden win, while RCP's suggested 7.2. Biden actually won by 4.5. Both (again) underestimated Trump support slightly was the main reason, but RCP's gauged Biden's support almost exactly, however. Their final average had Biden pegged at 51.2% support on election day and he wound up with 51.4%. Nate Silver's had Biden at 52.6% at the same point, resulting in a less accurate prediction overall. RCP doesn't try to be as "scientific" about which polls are credible or not, they just average and typically land on slightly more accurate predictions.
| sundin13 said: Polling really only works in aggregate (and even then it has issues), so it is hard for me to really accept the results of a single poll/pollster as proof of any big changes in preferences. Further, you can't really just put approval numbers over voting trends and expect a 1:1 trend. As voting is a comparison, you may disapprove of someone and still vote for them because the other candidate is worse. |
*shrugs* Well nothing is perfect. I just go based on the best data I can find that's available. Dunno what else you want. Thought the snapshot was worthy of mention and note.
