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But, again your premise is still made up. Approval ratings vs. popular vote share metric is always compared in a timeframe leading up to the elections. That's how they're quoted.
Approval ratings do matter--leading up to the election. Every single president's popular vote share in modern times has come within one percentage points of the average of his approval rating right leading up to the election. That's a fact.
Four year average approval rating, especially after the election is never used as a metric to gauge the worthiness of approval rating vs. popular vote share. And, if Trump had an approval rating of 38% right before the election, he would have lost by 18-20 points.
Aggregate polling data shows Trump with an approval rating under 40% (per gold standard 538) for 4 years yet he wins a national election and comes within 44k votes of winning another.
I’m left to conclude that approval rating means very little when determining one’s odds of winning a national election in the months or years leading up to the election.
"...the election was ultimately decided by ~44k votes over 3 states."
That's the point. It was close in those three states only, not over the whole country. If it wasn't for the Electoral College the election wouldn't have been considered close at all. Ultimately, even the bias of the Electoral College was not enough to overcome Trump's low numbers which reflected his ongoing low ratings.
And Biden got the most votes in history for a presidential candidate–more than 80 million.
A national election came down to 44k votes despite one of the candidates having an aggregate approval rating under 40% for 4 years.
Thus, I’m left to conclude that approval ratings are irrelevant in determine one’s odds of winning.
Location: In a city within a state where politicians come to get their PHDs in Corruption
2,908 posts, read 2,095,923 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Doncicmavsfan
Aggregate polling data shows Trump with an approval rating under 40% (per gold standard 538) for 4 years yet he wins a national election and comes within 44k votes of winning another.
I’m left to conclude that approval rating means very little when determining one’s odds of winning a national election in the months or years leading up to the election.
You're comparing apples to oranges, and bouncing back and forth between electoral college, approval rating months or years away from an election and chance of winning that election.
There's very little correlation between four year average approval percentage vs. popular vote share--sure, that I can buy. However, there's a very strong positive correlation between an approval leading up an election compared to the actual vote share in an election.
And, none of this has anything to do with electoral college.
You're comparing apples to oranges, and bouncing back and forth between electoral college, approval rating months or years away from an election and chance of winning that election.
There's very little correlation between four year average approval percentage vs. popular vote share--sure, that I can buy. However, there's a very strong positive correlation between an approval leading up an election compared to the actual vote share in an election.
And, none of this has anything to do with electoral college.
Sounds like word salad.
I will repeat:
Donald Trump had an aggregate approval rating of <40% for nearly the entire 4.5 years he spent as a president or presidential candidate.
Despite this, he won an election and followed it up by coming within 44k votes of winning a 2nd election.
A candidate CAN have an aggregate approval rating around or under 40% and still win a national election.
Evidence:
Trump wins in 2016 and comes within 44k votes of winning again in 2020.
Thus, an approval rating as low as 35-40% is not an accurate indicator of how a person will perform in national elections.
The reason for that is unclear. Is it bias in the polls? Difficulty in obtaining accurate data? Who knows.
I don't think anyone disputes your first assertion. Approval ratings are estimates the only "approval rating" that matters is the ballot box. Your assertion is evidenced by the 2016 election where someone can have a low approval rating (i.e. lose the popular vote) but still win the electoral college vote. I don't think anyone would disagree with that.
The question is your correlation between an approval rating, meant to mimic the popular vote, and the electoral college votes which may or may not represent the popular vote.
I guess my ultimate question here is....what's your point? Anyone who has taken elementary history knows that there have been 5 elections where the electoral college victor lost the popular vote. And anyone who understands statistics knows that "approval rating" is generally a meaningless indicator of anything. I could be a person who didn't approve of Trump's performance but still voted for him because he was better than Biden.
Location: In a city within a state where politicians come to get their PHDs in Corruption
2,908 posts, read 2,095,923 times
Reputation: 4478
Quote:
Originally Posted by Doncicmavsfan
Sounds like word salad.
I will repeat:
Donald Trump had an aggregate approval rating of <40% for nearly the entire 4.5 years he spent as a president or presidential candidate.
Despite this, he won an election and followed it up by coming within 44k votes of winning a 2nd election.
These are simply facts.
It's not a word salad, and you're being purposefully dense. You quoted a metric, used it out of context, and then compared it to two outcomes, neither of, which are true nor relatable.
I don't think anyone disputes your first assertion. Approval ratings are estimates the only "approval rating" that matters is the ballot box. Your assertion is evidenced by the 2016 election where someone can have a low approval rating (i.e. lose the popular vote) but still win the electoral college vote. I don't think anyone would disagree with that.
The question is your correlation between an approval rating, meant to mimic the popular vote, and the electoral college votes which may or may not represent the popular vote.
I guess my ultimate question here is....what's your point? Anyone who has taken elementary history knows that there have been 5 elections where the electoral college victor lost the popular vote. And anyone who understands statistics knows that "approval rating" is generally a meaningless indicator of anything. I could be a person who didn't approve of Trump's performance but still voted for him because he was better than Biden.
The point is that we can’t look at approval rating as an indicator of how a candidate will do as far as winning a national election.
During the entire Trump phenomenon we routinely saw people saying “Trump can’t possibly win — his approval rating is only ~38%!!”.
Fact is — a candidate can routinely have polling data indicating 35-40% approval yet still be very competitive in national elections.
That’s like saying a basketball team lost by 10 rebounds.
Popular votes is irrelevant.
It is irrelevant in election outcome, but it's not irrelevant when comparing votes to approval rating, which is the comparison that the OP chose to misinform about.
The OP chose to compare national approval rating against cherry picked popular votes in 3 states. Apples and oranges. Then you upped the ante by suggesting we should compare approval rating to Electoral results.
In a prior post, someone correctly stated that Popular Votes and approval at the time of the election were very well aligned. Which really disproves the OP's intended message, because "facts"....
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