Matthew Lynn

Pollsters should shut up shop after this election disaster

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High Street chains are closing all the time. The restaurant chains are shutting their doors. The gyms are going out of business and it doesn’t look as if all the airlines will survive. There have been lots of different industries that have been wiped out this year. But now we can add one more to the list: the polling companies.

It remains to be seen who won the US Presidential election. Donald Trump and Joe Biden may fight it out for a few more days yet. But it is absolutely clear who lost. The people who are paid plenty of money to talk to voters and work out what they are thinking.

It was meant to be a ‘Blue Wave’, meaning the Democrats would take both the White House and Congress, probably in a landslide. The forecasts based on polling predicted that with between 80 per cent and 90 per cent certainty.

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