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Monday, October 19, 2015

Canada's Election -- Will The Polling Trends Continue?

In the last year, there has been a consistent polling bias in elections.  In the elections in the USA, UK, and Israel (among other places), elections that were heavily polled resulted in surprising outcomes.  In each case, the more conservative parties did much better than the polls indicated they would.  David Cameron and the Tory party won a clear majority in Parliament when the pre-election polls predicted a possible Labour victory and, at least, a result in which no party got a majority of the seats.  In Israel, the Likud party of prime minister Netanyahu was said to be falling to second place behind the opposition in the polls, but the actual results ended with a major victory by the more conservative Likud.  In the USA last November, polls showed the Democrats likely to retain control of the Senate and possibly to pick up seats in the House.  The result gave the Republicans the largest majority for the party in the House since 1928 and a majority in the Senate as well.  The governors races were similar.  Now we have the Canadian election, and it will be interesting to see if the trend continues.  The latest polls show the Liberal party leading both the Conservatives and the New Democrats.  None of the three is projected to win a majority.  Can the Conservatives outperform the polls in Canada as was the case in the USA, UK and Israel?  We'll know the answer soon enough.




 

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