Comments on: Pew Research sees different polling results when cell phones are included

By: Brian Angliss

Brian Angliss — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 03:13:36 +0000

Thank you very much, Gericault! That’s exactly what I was looking for and couldn’t find.

By: Gericault

Gericault — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 02:24:43 +0000

Here’s a good article on cell phone use that lists some of the major polling companies that use this factor

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/09/estimating-cellphone-effect-22-points.html

By: Darrell

Darrell — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 02:13:41 +0000

Cell phone, and a John McCain Blackberry for work.

By: matt

matt — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 22:18:56 +0000

No land line here either and I do vote

By: Lex

Lex — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 21:43:12 +0000

No land line in this household either.

By: fikshun

fikshun — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 18:27:58 +0000

Count me among those who don’t have land lines. And yes, I vote.

By: Rho

Rho — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 17:21:42 +0000

Brian,

My wife and I are also getting a good deal having cable, broadband, & phone packaged but we have the land line primarily as a back-up. the ringers are off and neither one of us knows the number by memory. We use our cells phone almost exclusively.

Rho

By: Brian Angliss

Brian Angliss — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 17:08:19 +0000

Sam – My wife and I have considered going without a land line, but we’re presently getting a great deal on DSL, phone, and DirecTV bundled together, so purging the land line would actually cost us more money right now, not less. And while she was a teacher, a land line for irate parents to call made the most sense – no-one wants irate parents and obnoxious kids to have access to a teacher’s cell phone number.

By: JS OBrien

JS OBrien — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 16:53:32 +0000

Thanks for this, Brian. It’s a small difference, to be sure, and there are some massive questions about how many of this youth vote will actually turn out. But it does raise some very, very interesting questions about demographics in the swing states, doesn’t it?

Young voters, I’m guessing, tend to be urban (and better coverage for cell phones in urban areas would tend to make cell-only use more practical than in rural areas). Urban areas already vote for Democrats, on average, so the real impact, if there is any, may be in those states with sharp voting splits between urban and rural voters: Colorado, Oregon, Washington, and Virginia come to mind. If there really is a cell-phone effect, it might suggest that Obama will win Oregon and Washington, and may just win Colorado and Virginia. Virginia would be a stunner to me, and may well put him over the top.

Thanks again.

By: Jim Booth

Jim Booth — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 16:44:27 +0000

If these younger voters who are cell phone dependent can be counted on to turn out for the election, Brian, the figures I’ve seen suggest an advantage to Obama of several percentage points.

Let’s hope those figures are right….

By: Dr. Slammy

Dr. Slammy — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 16:42:04 +0000

Yup – a 2-3% error in McCain’s favor. So we have to factor in that and the closet racist factor, as well, and that may be 5% in the other direction.

Fun, fun.

My wife and I don’t have a land line, by the way.