#sofie makes too many polls

[sincerely-sofie]

Thank you for helping me reach a whopping 1,000 followers! Let's celebrate!

I'm setting up everything for my first ever stream! What would you guys like me to do for it?

[aaronsniderus]

Weekly Roundup: 7 Terrific Stories You Missed This Week

With life’s busy schedule, it’s hard for most of us to dig through all the information thrown our way. Each week we scour the media universe to find the most interesting and helpful articles, so you don’t have to. Take a look at what we’re reading this week.

8 ways to teach climate change in almost any classroom

NPR along with Ipsos found in a recent study that less than half of teachers polled (and a similar number of parents) are talking to kids about climate change. Many respondents cited the inability to connect climate change lessons with their curricula. Check out these ideas to help you teach kids about climate change through engaging and informative activities. (NPR)

17 Target tricks to keep a little extra money in your pocket

Target is known for its low prices and sprawling inventory, where you can get everything from bikinis to groceries to kitty litter. But while its low prices may save you from overspending at other stores, it’s also easy to blow your budget if you’re not disciplined against impulse buys. Before your next Target trip, check out these tips to help you save on the things you need to buy (and those you’re just going to buy anyway). (Buzzfeed)

Your money problems could be an actual money disorder

If you’ve tried to get a handle on your spending but find it difficult to break your habits, you may have a money disorder. Compulsive spending is just one of the several different kinds of money disorders that many people suffer from without knowing it. Check out this guide to money disorders. (HuffPost)

5 money-saving tips for every vacation

With summer right around the corner, you may be looking forward to a vacation on a tropical island or bustling foreign city. Before you leave, make sure you know how to save money while you’re away. No matter where you’re going, peruse these tips first to help you save money on vacation. (The Street)

How to know if you’re stressed out — or have toxic stress

Everyone gets stressed out sometimes, and some people are more stressed than others. The reasons behind stress can vary as much as the individual experiencing it, but it’s important to know when your stress is reaching toxic levels. Toxic stress is a specific condition that can be detrimental to your physical health, not to mention the toll on mental health. Learn the difference and understand when you might need to seek help de-stressing. (Bustle)

How to brag without sounding like a jerk

Nobody likes a bragger. But there are instances where it is totally appropriate to brag, like when you get a promotion, land your dream job or you book a fun vacation. If you fear you sound too braggy when telling your friends or coworkers about your achievements and blessings, take a look at these tips. Learning how to politely brag to your friends can help you boast about yourself when you need to, like at your next job interview or for an award nomination. (Brit + Co)

Money myths that can derail your finances

A huge factor in building wealth, getting out of debt and being generally successful with your finances is knowing how to use money. But learning about money can be difficult, with a confusing abundance of information on the internet and in the world. Make sure you watch out for these money myths that can actually hurt your wallet. (Fox Business)

Interested in refinancing student loans? Here are the top 6 lenders of 2019!

LenderVariable APREligible Degrees  Check out the testimonials and our in-depth reviews! 1 Important Disclosures for SoFi. SoFi Disclosures Student loan Refinance:

Fixed rates from 3.890% APR to 8.074% APR (with AutoPay). Variable rates from 2.500% APR to 7.115% APR (with AutoPay). Interest rates on variable rate loans are capped at either 8.95% or 9.95% depending on term of loan. See APR examples and terms. Lowest variable rate of 2.500% APR assumes current 1 month LIBOR rate of 2.50% plus 0.00% margin minus 0.25% ACH discount. Not all borrowers receive the lowest rate. If approved for a loan, the fixed or variable interest rate offered will depend on your creditworthiness, and the term of the loan and other factors, and will be within the ranges of rates listed above. For the SoFi variable rate loan, the 1-month LIBOR index will adjust monthly and the loan payment will be re-amortized and may change monthly. APRs for variable rate loans may increase after origination if the LIBOR index increases. See eligibility details. The SoFi 0.25% AutoPay interest rate reduction requires you to agree to make monthly principal and interest payments by an automatic monthly deduction from a savings or checking account. The benefit will discontinue and be lost for periods in which you do not pay by automatic deduction from a savings or checking account. *To check the rates and terms you qualify for, SoFi conducts a soft credit inquiry. Unlike hard credit inquiries, soft credit inquiries (or soft credit pulls) do not impact your credit score. Soft credit inquiries allow SoFi to show you what rates and terms SoFi can offer you up front. After seeing your rates, if you choose a product and continue your application, we will request your full credit report from one or more consumer reporting agencies, which is considered a hard credit inquiry. Hard credit inquiries (or hard credit pulls) are required for SoFi to be able to issue you a loan. In addition to requiring your explicit permission, these credit pulls may impact your credit score.

Terms and Conditions Apply. SOFI RESERVES THE RIGHT TO MODIFY OR DISCONTINUE PRODUCTS AND BENEFITS AT ANY TIME WITHOUT NOTICE. To qualify, a borrower must be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident in an eligible state and meet SoFi’s underwriting requirements. Not all borrowers receive the lowest rate. To qualify for the lowest rate, you must have a responsible financial history and meet other conditions. If approved, your actual rate will be within the range of rates listed above and will depend on a variety of factors, including term of loan, a responsible financial history, years of experience, income and other factors. Rates and Terms are subject to change at anytime without notice and are subject to state restrictions. SoFi refinance loans are private loans and do not have the same repayment options that the federal loan program offers such as Income Based Repayment or Income Contingent Repayment or PAYE. Licensed by the Department of Business Oversight under the California Financing Law License No. 6054612. SoFi loans are originated by SoFi Lending Corp., NMLS # 1121636. (www.nmlsconsumeraccess.org) 2 Important Disclosures for Earnest. Earnest Disclosures

To qualify, you must be a U.S. citizen or possess a 10-year (non-conditional) Permanent Resident Card, reside in a state Earnest lends in, and satisfy our minimum eligibility criteria. You may find more information on loan eligibility here: https://www.earnest.com/eligibility. Not all applicants will be approved for a loan, and not all applicants will qualify for the lowest rate. Approval and interest rate depend on the review of a complete application.

Earnest fixed rate loan rates range from 3.89% APR (with Auto Pay) to 7.89% APR (with Auto Pay). Variable rate loan rates range from 2.50% APR (with Auto Pay) to 7.27% APR (with Auto Pay). For variable rate loans, although the interest rate will vary after you are approved, the interest rate will never exceed 8.95% for loan terms 10 years or less. For loan terms of 10 years to 15 years, the interest rate will never exceed 9.95%. For loan terms over 15 years, the interest rate will never exceed 11.95% (the maximum rates for these loans). Earnest variable interest rate loans are based on a publicly available index, the one month London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR). Your rate will be calculated each month by adding a margin between 1.82% and 5.50% to the one month LIBOR. The rate will not increase more than once per month. Earnest rate ranges are current as of April 17, 2019, and are subject to change based on market conditions and borrower eligibility.

Auto Pay discount: If you make monthly principal and interest payments by an automatic, monthly deduction from a savings or checking account, your rate will be reduced by one quarter of one percent (0.25%) for so long as you continue to make automatic, electronic monthly payments. This benefit is suspended during periods of deferment and forbearance.

The information provided on this page is updated as of 04/17/2019. Earnest reserves the right to change, pause, or terminate product offerings at any time without notice. Earnest loans are originated by Earnest Operations LLC. California Finance Lender License 6054788. NMLS # 1204917. Earnest Operations LLC is located at 302 2nd Street, Suite 401N, San Francisco, CA 94107. Terms and Conditions apply. Visit https://www.earnest.com/terms-of-service, email us at hello@earnest.com, or call 888-601-2801 for more information on our student loan refinance product.

© 2018 Earnest LLC. All rights reserved. Earnest LLC and its subsidiaries, including Earnest Operations LLC, are not sponsored by or agencies of the United States of America.

3 Important Disclosures for Laurel Road. Laurel Road Disclosures

FIXED APR Fixed rate options consist of a range from 3.75% per year to 5.80% per year for a 5-year term, 4.25% per year to 6.25% per year for a 7-year term, 4.55% per year to 6.65% per year for a 10-year term, 4.85% per year to 7.05% per year for a 15-year term, or 5.30% per year to 7.27% per year for a 20-year term, with no origination fees. The fixed interest rate will apply until the loan is paid in full (whether before or after default, and whether before or after the scheduled maturity date of the loan). The monthly payment for a sample $10,000 loan at a range of 3.75% per year to 5.80% per year for a 5-year term would be from $183.04 to $192.40. The monthly payment for a sample $10,000 loan at a range of 4.25% per year to 6.25% per year for a 7-year term would be from $137.84 to $147.29. The monthly payment for a sample $10,000 loan at a range of 4.55% per year to 6.65% per year for a 10-year term would be from $103.88 to $114.31. The monthly payment for a sample $10,000 loan at a range of 4.85% per year to 7.05% per year for a 15-year term would be from $78.30 to $90.16. The monthly payment for a sample $10,000 loan at a range of 5.30% per year to 7.27% per year for a 20-year term would be from $67.66 to $79.16.

However, if the borrower chooses to make monthly payments automatically by electronic funds transfer (EFT) from a bank account, the fixed rate will decrease by 0.25%, and will increase back up to the regular fixed interest rate described in the preceding paragraph if the borrower stops making (or we stop accepting) monthly payments automatically by EFT from the designated borrower’s bank account.

VARIABLE APR Variable rate options consist of a range from 2.75% per year to 6.30% per year for a 5-year term, 4.00% per year to 6.35% per year for a 7-year term, 4.25% per year to 6.40% per year for a 10-year term, 4.50% per year to 6.65% per year for a 15-year term, or 4.75% per year to 6.90% per year for a 20-year term, with no origination fees. APR is subject to increase after consummation. The variable interest rate will change on the first day of every month (“Change Date”) if the Current Index changes. The variable interest rates are based on a Current Index, which is the 1-month London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) (currency in US dollars), as published on The Wall Street Journal’s website. The variable interest rates and Annual Percentage Rate (APR) will increase or decrease when the 1-month LIBOR index changes. The variable interest rates are calculated by adding a margin ranging from 0.25% to 3.80% for the 5-year term loan, 1.50% to 3.85% for the 7-year term loan, 1.75% to 3.90% for the 10-year term loan, 2.00% to 4.15% for the 15-year term loan, and 2.25% to 4.40% for the 20-year term loan, respectively, to the 1-month LIBOR index published on the 25th day of each month immediately preceding each “Change Date,” as defined above, rounded to two decimal places, with no origination fees. If the 25th day of the month is not a business day or is a US federal holiday, the reference date will be the most recent date preceding the 25th day of the month that is a business day. The monthly payment for a sample $10,000 loan at a range of 2.75% per year to 6.30% per year for a 5-year term would be from $178.58 to $194.73. The monthly payment for a sample $10,000 loan at a range of 4.00% per year to 6.35% per year for a 7-year term would be from $136.69 to $147.77. The monthly payment for a sample $10,000 loan at a range of 4.25% per year to 6.40% per year for a 10-year term would be from $102.44 to $113.04. The monthly payment for a sample $10,000 loan at a range of 4.50% per year to 6.65% per year for a 15-year term would be from $76.50 to $87.94. The monthly payment for a sample $10,000 loan at a range of 4.75% per year to 6.90% per year for a 20-year term would be from $64.62 to $76.93.

However, if the borrower chooses to make monthly payments automatically by electronic funds transfer (EFT) from a bank account, the variable rate will decrease by 0.25%, and will increase back up to the regular variable interest rate described in the preceding paragraph if the borrower stops making (or we stop accepting) monthly payments automatically by EFT from the designated borrower’s bank account.

All credit products are subject to credit approval.

Laurel Road began originating student loans in 2013 and has since helped thousands of professionals with undergraduate and postgraduate degrees consolidate and refinance more than $4 billion in federal and private school loans. Laurel Road also offers a suite of online graduate school loan products and personal loans that help simplify lending through customized technology and personalized service. In April 2019, Laurel Road was acquired by KeyBank, one of the nation’s largest bank-based financial services companies. Laurel Road is a brand of KeyBank National Association offering online lending products in all 50 U.S. states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. All loans are provided by KeyBank National Association, a nationally chartered bank. Member FDIC. For more information, visit www.laurelroad.com.

4 Important Disclosures for LendKey. LendKey Disclosures

Refinancing via LendKey.com is only available for applicants with qualified private education loans from an eligible institution. Loans that were used for exam preparation classes, including, but not limited to, loans for LSAT, MCAT, GMAT, and GRE preparation, are not eligible for refinancing with a lender via LendKey.com. If you currently have any of these exam preparation loans, you should not include them in an application to refinance your student loans on this website. Applicants must be either U.S. citizens or Permanent Residents in an eligible state to qualify for a loan. Certain membership requirements (including the opening of a share account and any applicable association fees in connection with membership) may apply in the event that an applicant wishes to accept a loan offer from a credit union lender. Lenders participating on LendKey.com reserve the right to modify or discontinue the products, terms, and benefits offered on this website at any time without notice. LendKey Technologies, Inc. is not affiliated with, nor does it endorse, any educational institution.

5 Important Disclosures for CommonBond. CommonBond Disclosures

Offered terms are subject to change. Loans are offered by CommonBond Lending, LLC (NMLS # 1175900). If you are approved for a loan, the interest rate offered will depend on your credit profile, your application, the loan term selected and will be within the ranges of rates shown.

All Annual Percentage Rates (APRs) displayed assume borrowers enroll in auto pay and account for the 0.25% reduction in interest rate. All variable rates are based on a 1-month LIBOR assumption of 2.49% effective March 10, 2019.

6 Important Disclosures for Citizens Bank. Citizens Bank Disclosures Education Refinance Loan Rate Disclosure: Variable rate, based on the one-month London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) published in The Wall Street Journal on the twenty-fifth day, or the next business day, of the preceding calendar month. As of April 1, 2019, the one-month LIBOR rate is 2.50%. Variable interest rates range from 3.00% – 9.74% (3.00% – 9.74% APR) and will fluctuate over the term of the borrower’s loan with changes in the LIBOR rate, and will vary based on applicable terms, level of degree earned and presence of a co-signer. Fixed interest rates range from 3.89% – 9.99% (3.89% – 9.99% APR) based on applicable terms, level of degree earned and presence of a co-signer. Lowest rates shown are for eligible, creditworthy applicants with a graduate level degree, require a 5-year repayment term and include our Loyalty discount and Automatic Payment discounts of 0.25 percentage points each, as outlined in the Loyalty and Automatic Payment Discount disclosures. The maximum variable rate on the Education Refinance Loan is the greater of 21.00% or Prime Rate plus 9.00%. Subject to additional terms and conditions, and rates are subject to change at any time without notice. Such changes will only apply to applications taken after the effective date of change. Please note: Due to federal regulations, Citizens Bank is required to provide every potential borrower with disclosure information before they apply for a private student loan. The borrower will be presented with an Application Disclosure and an Approval Disclosure within the application process before they accept the terms and conditions of their loan. Federal Loan vs. Private Loan Benefits: Some federal student loans include unique benefits that the borrower may not receive with a private student loan, some of which we do not offer with the Education Refinance Loan. Borrowers should carefully review their current benefits, especially if they work in public service, are in the military, are currently on or considering income based repayment options or are concerned about a steady source of future income and would want to lower their payments at some time in the future. When the borrower refinances, they waive any current and potential future benefits of their federal loans and replace those with the benefits of the Education Refinance Loan. For more information about federal student loan benefits and federal loan consolidation, visit http://studentaid.ed.gov/. We also have several resources available to help the borrower make a decision at http://www.citizensbank.com/EdRefinance, including Should I Refinance My Student Loans? and our FAQs. Should I Refinance My Student Loans? includes a comparison of federal and private student loan benefits that we encourage the borrower to review. Citizens Bank Education Refinance Loan Eligibility: Eligible applicants may not be currently enrolled. Applicants with an Associate’s degree or with no degree must have made at least 12 qualifying payments after leaving school. Qualifying payments are the most recent on time and consecutive payments of principal and interest on the loans being refinanced. Primary borrowers must be a U.S. citizen, permanent resident or resident alien with a valid U.S. Social Security Number residing in the United States. Resident aliens must apply with a co-signer who is a U.S. citizen or permanent resident. The co-signer (if applicable) must be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident with a valid U.S. Social Security Number residing in the United States. For applicants who have not attained the age of majority in their state of residence, a co-signer will be required. Citizens Bank reserves the right to modify eligibility criteria at anytime. Interest rate ranges subject to change. Education Refinance Loans are subject to credit qualification, completion of a loan application/consumer credit agreement, verification of application information, certification of borrower’s student loan amount(s) and highest degree earned. Loyalty Discount Disclosure: The borrower will be eligible for a 0.25 percentage point interest rate reduction on their loan if the borrower or their co-signer (if applicable) has a qualifying account in existence with us at the time the borrower and their co-signer (if applicable) have submitted a completed application authorizing us to review their credit request for the loan. The following are qualifying accounts: any checking account, savings account, money market account, certificate of deposit, automobile loan, home equity loan, home equity line of credit, mortgage, credit card account, or other student loans owned by Citizens Bank, N.A. Please note, our checking and savings account options are only available in the following states: CT, DE, MA, MI, NH, NJ, NY, OH, PA, RI, and VT and some products may have an associated cost. This discount will be reflected in the interest rate disclosed in the Loan Approval Disclosure that will be provided to the borrower once the loan is approved. Limit of one Loyalty Discount per loan and discount will not be applied to prior loans. The Loyalty Discount will remain in effect for the life of the loan. Automatic Payment Discount Disclosure: Borrowers will be eligible to receive a 0.25 percentage point interest rate reduction on their student loans owned by Citizens Bank, N.A. during such time as payments are required to be made and our loan servicer is authorized to automatically deduct payments each month from any bank account the borrower designates. Discount is not available when payments are not due, such as during forbearance. If our loan servicer is unable to successfully withdraw the automatic deductions from the designated account three or more times within any 12-month period, the borrower will no longer be eligible for this discount. Co-signer Release: Borrowers may apply for co-signer release after making 36 consecutive on-time payments of principal and interest. For the purpose of the application for co-signer release, on-time payments are defined as payments received within 15 days of the due date. Interest only payments do not qualify. The borrower must meet certain credit and eligibility guidelines when applying for the co-signer release. Borrowers must complete an application for release and provide income verification documents as part of the review. Borrowers who use deferment or forbearance will need to make 36 consecutive on-time payments after reentering repayment to qualify for release. The borrower applying for co-signer release must be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident. If an application for co-signer release is denied, the borrower may not reapply for co-signer release until at least one year from the date the application for co-signer release was received. Terms and conditions apply. Borrowers whose loans were funded prior to reaching the age of majority may not be eligible for co-signer release. Note: co-signer release is not available on the Student Loan for Parents or Education Refinance Loan for Parents. 2.50% – 7.27%1Undergrad & Graduate

Visit Earnest

2.50% – 7.12%3Undergrad & Graduate

Visit SoFi

2.53% – 8.79%4Undergrad & Graduate

Visit Lendkey

2.50% – 6.65%2Undergrad & Graduate

Visit Laurel Road

2.55% – 7.12%5Undergrad & Graduate

Visit CommonBond

3.00% – 9.74%6Undergrad & Graduate

Visit Citizens

Our team at Student Loan Hero works hard to find and recommend products and services that we believe are of high quality. We sometimes earn a sales commission or advertising fee when recommending various products and services to you. Similar to when you are being sold any product or service, be sure to read the fine print to help you understand what you are buying. Be sure to consult with a licensed professional if you have any concerns. Student Loan Hero is not a lender or investment advisor. We are not involved in the loan approval or investment process, nor do we make credit or investment related decisions. The rates and terms listed on our website are estimates and are subject to change at any time.

The post Weekly Roundup: 7 Terrific Stories You Missed This Week appeared first on Student Loan Hero.

from Updates About Loans https://studentloanhero.com/featured/weekly-roundup-43/

[thetrumpdebacle]

Donald Trump’s 2016 election victory took many by surprise – most of the polling had suggested a victory for Hillary Clinton. But were the polls wrong? In new research Manfred te Grotenhuis, Subu Subramanian, Rense Nieuwenhuis, Ben Pelzer and Rob Eisinga examine the election polls’ accuracy by randomly sampling from each state’s observed voters for Clinton or Trump. They find that a relatively small polling bias which saw Republicans underrepresented in a number of key states tipped the polling – and therefore the predicted probability that she would win – in favor of Hillary Clinton. 

Ahead of Election Day in 2016, the statistics and polling analysis site FiveThirtyEight gave former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton a 70 percent probability to win the presidential election.  This prediction was based on an average of many US polls. According to the American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR) this prediction turned out to be incorrect because of a) a real change in voters’ preferences just before the election, b) an overrepresentation of college graduates in some poll samples and c) late-revealing Trump voters.

What has been generally overlooked is that the polls leading up to the election actually did not perform so badly at all. For instance, the state-level predictions of FiveThirtyEight were in agreement with the actual electoral outcomes for no less than 45 US states plus the District of Columbia. If we sum all electoral votes in these states we get a virtually neck and neck result of 231 votes for Trump and 232 for Clinton. In Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and North Carolina FiveThirtyEight had predicted wrongly.  Apart from North Carolina, in these states the electoral margins were extremely narrow. For instance in Michigan 47.5 percent of all votes went to Trump and 47.3 percent to Clinton! Those narrow electoral margins probably made it hard to predict the outcome in a reliable way given the sample sizes polls used. This is important to note because the 2016 US presidential election was won in Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin with their decisive total of 75 electoral votes.

In a perfect world, polls sample from the population of voters, who would state their political preference perfectly clearly and then vote accordingly. However, results from small random samples can be quite unreliable due to extremely narrow electoral margins. To calculate the probability of winning the 2016 US presidential election in that perfect world, we drew 1 million random samples (with a reasonable sample size of 1,500) from each of the four key state’s observed votes for Clinton, Trump, and other candidates. Next, we counted the number of random samples with the most votes for Trump and the number of samples with Clinton as the winner.

In Florida, about 677 out of every 1,000 random samples had Trump as a winner, 314 samples favorited Clinton, and 9 samples turned out to be inconclusive. Next to Florida, we calculated the probability of a Clinton victory in Michigan at 46 percent, and both Pennsylvania and Wisconsin at 39 percent, again after drawing a million random samples per state from the known population of voters. Recall that Clinton already had 232 votes from the other states + DC, and thus needed another 38 electoral votes to become the first female US president. This implies she had to win Florida plus at least one of the other three battleground states or win in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. To illustrate: Hillary Clinton had a 2 percent (.314 x .463 x .387 x .385) predicted probability of winning all four states. The probability, then, of winning the 2016 presidential election is the sum of all eight winning combinations and amounted to 29 percent. For Donald Trump, the eight paths to victory added up to 67 percent. To get a notion of how heavily the predicted probabilities depend upon sample size, we calculated the probabilities for Clinton to win for sample sizes between 100 and 5,000 (see Figure 1).

Figure 1 – The estimated probability of a Clinton victory using random samples from the actual 2016 US presidential election results

The estimated probability for Clinton to win is not much higher than 35 percent in the graph above. With random samples of 1,500 voters per state it is around 30 percent. This number indicates that on average we will incorrectly predict Clinton as the winner of the 2016 US election 3 out of 10 times when random samples of 1,500 are used. On the basis of these calculations, the narrow 2016 electoral margins in the four battleground states are not a large threat to the validity of the polls’ predictions.

“#clinton as #trump” by Oli Goldsmith is licensed under CC BY SA 2.0

Next we investigate the effect of small sampling bias on the polling results in the four crucial battleground states.  Clinton was predicted to win the popular vote (i.e. the total number of votes) with a difference of about 3 percent while in reality this was close to 2 percent.  Under the assumption that this 1 percent bias is state-independent, we added this number to the actual electoral outcomes. To illustrate: in Pennsylvania Clinton received 47.9 percent of the votes and Trump 48.6 percent.  So we increased the population of Democrat voters to 47.9 + 1 = 48.9 percent. Consequently the population of Republication voters was decreased to 48.6 – 1 = 47.6 percent. Next, we randomly drew 1 million random samples per state from these 1 percent biased populations and recalculated the overall probability to win the elections. This rather small sampling bias made the predicted probability of 70 percent for Trump to win change into a 30 percent win, a prediction more or less in line with most polls’ predictions just before Election Day.

Next, we calculated the chances of a win for Clinton for all sample sizes between 100 and 5000, after taking into account a 1 percent bias. As can be seen in Figure 2, the wrong prediction rapidly increased as the sample size rose. So, with large samples almost in 9 out of 10 times Clinton is falsely predicted to be the winner of the elections. This makes perfect sense: the 1 percent bias in Democratic voters is detected well by these large samples, consequently Clinton received the false favorable odds of winning the elections.

Figure 2 – The estimated probability of a Clinton victory using random samples drawn from the 2016 US presidential election results + a 1 percent Democratic bias.

The importance of quality poll samples when margins are narrow

In the last US presidential election polls handed Clinton a fair chance to win the elections. The explanation for this mishap probably is not small sample sizes or too narrow electoral margins as such. The point is that the polls very likely sampled from a population that just was not sufficiently representing Republicans. In most states that small representation bias was of no importance as the electoral margins were wide enough. However, in four crucial battleground states with a large reservoir of electoral votes, margins were very narrow and enabled the small bias to dramatically tip the scale and made the polls predict the overall odds in favor of Clinton.

When things get this tight again, high quality samples are needed, which are far more representative of the US voters than the 2016 samples. However, even highly representative samples cannot repair the bias of late changes in political preferences and late-revealing. They will always be a snapshot of a population that for some part has not fully made its mind up yet. We have to realize that political polls at best are a fair prediction at some point in time and may constitute a wrong forecast of the actual election result, just because one candidate may have a larger share of late-revealers than the other. With this in mind both pollsters and the media may have been a little too self-assured when they presented the results of yet another US 2016 election poll.

          For further details see http://ift.tt/2BPA80A. 

Please read our comments policy before commenting.           

Note:  This article gives the views of the author, and not the position of USAPP – American Politics and Policy, nor the London School of Economics.

Shortened URL for this post: http://bit.ly/2nxIHbn

 _________________________________ 

About the authors 

Manfred te Grotenhuis – Radboud University Manfred te Grotenhuis is an associate professor of quantitative data analysis at Radboud University and an affiliate of the Interuniversity Center for Social Science Theory and Methodology (ICS). He does research and teaching in inferential statistics, age-period-cohort models, multilevel modeling, event history analysis, and SPSS syntax. 

Subu Subramanian – Harvard University S V Subramanian (“Subu”) is a Professor of Population Health and Geography at Harvard University, and Director of a University-wide Initiative on Applied Quantitative Methods in Social Sciences. He was also the Founding Director of Graduate Studies for the interdisciplinary PhD program in Population Health Sciences.

Rense Nieuwenhuis – Swedish Institute for Social Research Rense Nieuwenhuis is a is an assistant professor at the Swedish Institute for Social Research (SOFI). He is a quantitative sociologist interested in how the interplay between social policies and demographic trends gives rise to economic inequalities. 

  Ben Pelzer – Radboud University Ben Pelzer  is an Assistant Professor of Quantitative Research Methods at the Department of Sociology / Social Science Research Methods of Radboud University. 

  Rob Eisinga – Radboud University Rob Eisinga is a professor of quantitative research methods at Radboud University. His substantive interests concern the analysis of social and political change, including electoral and religious behavior, and the obesity epidemic. His current methodological interest is in the analysis of rank data and their null distribution in particular.

via The Trump Debacle

[sincerely-sofie]

[sincerely-sofie]

Okay, question time.

Examples of the style I'd draw these hypothetical stickers in:

[sincerely-sofie]

OKAY, YOU KNOW WHAT?

I make no promises! However: If I started streaming digital art, animatic work, making 3D models, game dev, writing sessions, and actually playing games...

[sincerely-sofie]

Rules: put your music library on shuffle, then list the first five songs that come up in a poll to let people vote for which one they like the most.

NPT: @the-real-obby, @azalea-korita, @blessed-pizza, @mysteryampharos, and @justabeewithapen + anyone wants to participate in this! Tag yourself! Have fun!

[sincerely-sofie]

ATTENTION ALL SINCERELY-SOFIE FOLLOWERS. THIS IS A MEGA IMPORTANT QUESTION.

What category do you feel my hypothetical fursona would fall under?

If you have any thoughts on or ideas about this completely hypothetical fursona or what it should be, feel free to send them as an ask, whether publicly or on Anon!

[sincerely-sofie]

Wanna help Sofie design a fursona that’s a bug? A bugsona? Vote in this poll to help decide its species! Reference images appear in the order they’re named below!

[sincerely-sofie]

Alrighty, the results of the poll I posted asking what people wanted for a finalized product of my PMD2 AU The Present is a Gift are in! About 40% of people who indicated a preference for medium preferred the option of a written fanfic with simple illustrations sprinkled throughout the text, and about 60% indicated a preference for a webcomic. While the webcomic-likers are in the majority of this group, I didn’t exactly present any of my written work as something to judge off of despite posting comics pretty much daily. That definitely skews things.

So! To remedy this, I’m including a little sampler for the illustrated fanfic option, plus another poll at the end of this post to see if said sampler changes your mind on what you would like to see medium-wise. Without further ado, here’s a quick context summary and the aforementioned sampler!

CONTEXT: Darkrai wakes Twig from a nightmare in this scene, but in doing so witnesses a memory of her past that she's been hiding the return of from everyone she knows.

Twig’s surroundings seemed to stutter— jerking back and forth between slow and erratic before beginning to melt. She forced herself to look up from the ground at her feet. She found ice-blue eyes staring back at her from across the visceral scene. And then everything was gone, sloughed off like a second skin, leaving nothing but dripping shadows behind.

Suddenly, she was lying on her stomach, with her guts clenching in fear and a hand on her shoulder. She sucked in ragged gasps as panic gripped her, and when she finally came to enough to recognize Darkrai looming at her bedside, she waved him away perhaps a bit more violently than was needed— though it was hard to care when she desperately needed to focus on getting control of her breathing.

When her lungs finally decided to listen to reason, she spat a quick flame and lit the lamp she kept next to her bed. Darkrai swiftly retreated into the shadows, settling in the opposite end of the room and out of reach of the lamp's illumination, though not that of her tail’s flame. His eyes never left her.

She didn't ask for an explanation. He still broke the silence with one. "You looked unwell. Pained."

Oh. She let out a short, dry laugh at that. Guess he freaked out the same way she had when Grovyle took a nap around her for the first time. She'd woken him in a panic because she thought he was dying, what with how he cringed and contorted himself in his sleep.

"You wouldn't wake when addressed, nor when shaken," he continued.

Another dry sound, though this one walked the line between laugh and sob. The irony was not lost on her— Darkrai, lord of nightmares, unsettled by someone being affected by his powers. It was kind of sweet, in a pitifully twisted way.

Despite her reluctance to ask it, she still found a question falling from her mouth half-formed. “How much did you…?"

Silence.

When he finally spoke, it was with a noticeable discomfort in his unflappable tone, and for a heartbeat, he turned away. "Enough," he murmured. "I saw enough."

Quiet swallowed the room again, the flicker of lamplight the only motion in the awful stillness. The pokemon across from her was unmoving, unflinching. He didn't look away again, and the way his gaze dissected her every twitch was nauseating.

This was, to put it in the most joyous of terms possible, agony. Real, true agony beyond anything she’d experienced. Agony because she hadn't told anyone about this memory since it returned. Agony because it was the only memory that had returned. Agony because it was Darkrai that found out. Agony because Darkrai had already found out, before his botched escape into the passage of time, and he hadn't said anything— and not out of some sense of compassion or pity. It was because she knew what the icy gaze that flashed in her nightmares back then meant, and because he knew she had witnessed him prying. It was because she had a dirty little secret she hadn't admitted to anyone—that she had barely even admitted it to herself— and he had made it into a carrot on a stick, into something to get her to pay attention and follow along with everything he said and did— because if her focus slipped up for a second as he spoke to the terrified people of Treasure Town, he would hint, and people would worry, and she couldn't handle the people who deserved so much more than her fretting over someone who didn't even deserve to exist.

(When Kip and Twig refused to fight Darkrai initially, he decided to give them a bit of motivation to confront him in his trap. Everyone in Treasure Town began having nightmares of their worst memories whenever they closed their eyes. She overheard the Guildmaster quietly discussing an old mentor he was forced to part from with Chatot. Marill came to the market alone one day, looking skittish and fearful, and said Azurill was torn up about the mess with Drowzee bugging him again. Kip cried on Twig's shoulder about seeing his parents in his nightmares, only for them to disappear without a trace as evening fell and the happy memory curdled— a newly christened orphan, the old wound made fresh once more.

(Twig had nothing. No bad dreams whatsoever. No nightly reminders of why she'd left humanity behind. No midnight rehearsals of the reason she kept her distance from everyone but the select few who could touch her under specific circumstances. Nothing.

(Darkrai knew. And this felt somewhere between an olive branch and a debt he intended to collect.

(Twig said she'd been dreaming of the execution posts in the Dark Future. Kip nodded sympathetically through his tears.)

She took a deep breath, staring at the cold, pinprick glow coming from the darkness of her home.

He had known before. And he knew now. Might as well take back some of the control here and explain what he no doubt was registering wasn't just the figment of a stressed-out, weary brain.

"I was human, once," she said.

The light of his eyes dipped and raised, barely, as he nodded. He knew that already.

OMITTED: Twig describes her backstory as a human here. This is not included due to her original backstory now being of dubious canon thanks to rewrites. You can imagine whatever tragic incident you suspect motivated Twig to the surface is described here and it’ll do the job.

"… I couldn't live like that, and I couldn’t stomach the thought of speaking out, so I left. Grovyle found me, and the rest is history."

The glow of Darkrai's eyes in the dark didn't waver.

"It's not… It’s not a big deal, you know. I don't even have the same body that any of it happened to, anymore."

He didn't speak.

This silence was going to strangle her. Would he just react, already? She said all of this to take ownership of the secret’s reveal, but it still felt like he was the one holding all the cards here, even if he had a distinct air of unease about him despite his menacing presence in the darkness.

"You knew,” she said. She intended it to be comforting— a way to smooth over the tension in the air. A lie of omission where one could assume he had been her trusted confidant in an ugly situation, instead of teasing at the truth in front of everyone she knew.

Silence.

"Nobody else did, not even Kip, or Grovyle, or— anybody. But you knew," she repeated herself, feeling her voice jitter with nerves.

But he saw through the lie, because of course he did— because she couldn't keep any secret away from ice-blue vivisection. Not then, and not now.

"You didn't want me to," he murmured, and it wasn't a question. He knew. He always did, and he always would.

She put out the lamp and rolled over to face the wall, and she didn't speak another word all night.

[sincerely-sofie]

I'm currently figuring out all the logistics of taking commissions... This stuff is INTENSE y'all.

I'm mainly considering making sets of Discord emotes, piecing together headshots / profile pics, designing stickers, or drawing singular Pokemon OCs with simple backgrounds right now. Nothing very intensive, and I definitely wouldn't have many commission slots open at a time, but OHHHH man is it intimidating. Speaking of...

It’s poll time, babey!!!!!

Some examples of my artwork:

[sincerely-sofie]

Hey uh… Fans of my PMD2 The Present is a Gift AU… I got a question for y’all.

[sincerely-sofie]

QUESTION: If I were to do the Six Fanarts Drawing Challenge, how would you guys like me to do it?

Would it be more fun for you if I did a variant challenge, like drawing fanart of 6 characters that people say remind them of me? Would y'all enjoy a specific fandom angle, like Hollow Knight or PMD? Would you like me to draw your OCs?

For that last option--- one other art challenge I'm considering is the color wheel character challenge! I'm also pondering doing redraws of images that people could send in--- anything from Ghibli screenshots to memes--- so that's a strong contender as well!

[sincerely-sofie]

I don’t know how fanfiction sites work, as I don’t read fanfic much at all personally. So I’m calling on you to educate me on the sites you prefer. I ask thee, o followers…

[sincerely-sofie]

‼️ ALRIGHTY THAT’S IT I’M GOING TO ASK THE QUESTION YOU GUYS: ‼️

[sincerely-sofie]

Probably should've asked this before I started uploading The Present is a Gift, but you know what they say... there's no time like the present! *ba dum tshhhh*

Let's decide fic update schedules!

Keep in mind that TPiaG is fully written, so there's no need to worry about me burning out while writing to keep up with whatever update schedule people like!