Calling All Voters
Did you ever not answer a phone call because you didn’t recognize the phone number on your caller ID? Yeah, me too.
It’s a fact in the 21st century that we now screen our calls because of scammers, phishers, telemarketers, bots, and cold call salesmen. We even screen our emails and text messages.
So how in the ever-blazing fires of H-E-double-hockey-sticks do we think we can use the same techniques to conduct public opinion surveys that we used in the pre-internet days? If it makes any sense, it makes no sense at all.
The last time that I answered the phone to a political pollster, it turned out to be a “push poll.” Its purpose was not to gauge public opinion but instead to elicit a reaction for or against a candidate. For example, “Do you favor allowing millions of illegal aliens with fentanyl and COVID into our country, or do you want to elect Joe Blow?”
That was the last time I participated in a telephone poll, and my responses were all as disingenuous as the poll.
This graph from Pew Research underscores the whole issue.
Get it? Over a 25-year period, phone poll response rates have dropped from 36% to 3%, a whopping drop of 1200%!
Pollsters have defended their science by citing a growing reliance upon online surveys. But excuse me if I object: online response is the antithesis of gathering data with any statistical significance at all. There is a high probability that mainly interested parties will be the primary respondents.
A caveat is that polling results always note an error bar or “margin of error”. And probably the only positive thing on that front is that the percent error is about 50% higher than those that I noted in polls a couple of decades ago.
The best thing that I can say about polling these days is that it reveals relative change over time. But the common conclusion that “It’s gonna be tight” is anachronistic in a time when winners’ and losers’ vote totals always fall within 5% of each other.
It seems that survey panels are a big thing now. That’s a group of people who have agreed to take surveys on a regular basis. Pew Research has their own panel of about 10,000 people called the American Trends Panel. Gallup, YouGov and plenty of other pollsters have their own panels of easy to go to respondents. There are also plenty of third party companies that will provide panels for all your political, social or product survey needs. Polls have become a joke.
1I don’t answer unknown phone numbers-if it is really a call for me they can leave a message. And I have never trusted polling calls. Determining which might be legitimate and which are push polls is not worth my time or worry. So poll numbers may sound interesting, even if they are vastly inaccurate, but they will get no opinions from me.
2The question I hate is “Do you think the country is going in the right direction?”
It’s basically meaningless. If asked now, I would say “No, because of the Republican drive into Fascism. But since there’s a Democratic administration, the pollster can easily frame my (and similar) answers as criticism.
3A while ago some rather respectable polling outfits actually got my ear. They were attached to rather well known post secondary education institutions. As I recall, one was in Connecticut and the other in New Jersey. They were actually worth my time. It was also a “miracle” that I even answered their calls. For some strange reason I was under a barrage of recorded phone calls from some guy named Trump! They were damn awful, starting out with yelling about Nancy Pelosi! I now do more “blocking” on my cell phone than anything else!
4I once got a phone call from a “Republican Issues Poll. I said the only issue I had with republicans was that they weren’t being hung fast enough. They hung up on me and I never got another call from them.
5Similarly, what conclusions are we to draw from a series of
6man-on-the-street interviews from the pool of people hanging out at a diner during traditional working hours.
I’m way old and still use a landline. The only calls I get on it are from my kids, 3 friends and doctor’s offices. So I answer unknown callers. In every election season I get push polled a couple times a week. Lately some are plain mean. They ask who do you prefer x or y. Then start in if I told you x was a lying sob who stays drunk most of the time would it change your opinion? That’s when my games begin.
7I suspect that the respondant rates are far lower for the youngsters than for us oldsters. Even among themselves, the college-aged and younger send text instead of making voice calls. Especially for connecting up and dating, making voice calls is regarded as a sign of mental illness (no, I’m not exaggerating about that).
John@5 has hit on one of my pet peeves. Most working people don’t have the time (or money for the minimum waged) to go to political pep rallies, or dally about in public places. Trump is infamous for showing up hours late, then bloviating wildly long after the event was supposed to end. So the ones seen at Republican events really are a fringe group. [Plus now they are waving around sperm sample jars labelled with JD Vance’s name. The vast majority of Americans would say “Eeeuuuw” about that. At least, I hope they would.]
8Funny how when the “polls” showed drumpf ahead, he was all giddy and obnoxious about Biden. Now it’s all fake because they turned around to where he’s losing in many/most, so it pisses him off. That makes the polls have some value to me.
9In Alabama I get calls that start out asking if I plan to vote in the Republican or Democratic primary. As soon as I say Democratic, they hang up. Crone, I will never give up my land line, it’s the only way I can find my cell phone when I set it down and walk off and leave it around the house!
10RE: Landlines– I was always going to keep my home landline. but the Telcom kept jacking the monthly bill up (a series of Telcoms as mergers and acquisitions took place for the rural area).
But I finally had enough when the bill went over $65/mo.
I simply ported my local number, unique to the town, into my cellular system account.
Still a local number, but with the advantages and disadvantages of a cellular/mobile line, at a third of the cost per month.
And nuisance calls have just about ceased, because when the battery runs out for a few days those callers must drop the number.
A real landlines does have a few advantages, most important of which is maintaining service in most disruptive periods over the cable connection to a real central office. But it’s a tradeoff…
11BTW, y’all might look into getting “Dual SIM” type model cellular smartphones.
12You can have two unique, fully functional, cellular lines on the one phone.
Really a great way to go, just carry one phone for both lines. I’ve used dual simms for many years.
Katherine @9
Don’t ever move. We get a landline as a spiff because dh worked for the phone company. Last time I asked they said it would not be replaced if I ever moved.
It is fun to play with the Rs and MAGAs when they are push polling.
13Katherine (and others): if you really want to be taken off their list, when asked for party affiliation say “Socialist Workers Party”. In person, people will recoil as if you’ve admitted to killing and BBQ-ing infants.
The beauty of it is that everyone hates the SWP. It was founded by Leon Trotsky, so even old-style hard core communists regard it as lower than the Nazi party.
Sandridge@12: another advantage of dual SIMs is that you can use one for international access, the other for North America.
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