CBS News/YouGov poll in Ohio: Trump behind by 6 points
By Results of a new poll carried out by CBS News/YouGov were released. The poll asked interviewees from Ohio for whom they will vote: Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton or Republican candidate Donald Trump.
Ohio is traditionally a swing state, where the Republican and Democratic candidates have often achieved similar levels of voter support. This is why the election outcome in that state is viewed as important in determining the overall result of the presidential election.
CBS News/YouGov poll results
According to the results, 46.0% of respondents are going to vote for former New York Senator Hillary Clinton, while 40.0% would vote for billionaire Donald Trump.
The poll was conducted from August 17 to August 19 with 997 likely voters. There is a sampling error of +/-3.9 percentage points. Considering this error margin, the race is currently a statistical tie.
Putting the results in context
In general, however, a good strategy is to not have too much faith in the results of single polls, because they often incorporate large errors. At least, one should examine how a poll's results compare to benchmark forecasts.
In order to make the results comparable to forecasts from other methods, one can convert them into two-party vote shares. This yields figures of 53.5% for Clinton and 46.5% for Trump.
Results vs. other polls
An average of recent polls in Ohio sees Clinton at 51.7% of the two-party vote. Compared to her numbers in the CBS News/YouGov poll Clinton's poll average is 1.8 percentage points worse. This deviation is within the poll's margin of error, which suggests that the poll is not an outlier.
Results compared to the combined PollyVote forecast
The latest PollyVote predicts Clinton to gain 52.0% of the two-party vote in Ohio. This means that the combined PollyVote is 1.5 points below her polling numbers. Again, a look at the poll's error margin reveals that this difference is insignificant.
