Updated predictions- How many House seats do you think Dems will pick up?

[politicallefty]

As the polls roll in on a seat by seat basis, and the "experts" chime in, my off the wall prediction of two weeks ago is beginning to look pretty good for the moment. If one splits the toss ups between the parties, the Dems end up with 224 seats, for a net gain of 29. That is my prediction for the moment: 29 seats.

The Dems are picking off the wounded from the herd, and the open seats in otherwise competitive districts, plus a couple of others, but competent incumbents not in the Pub death zone of northern higher SES white districts packed with never Trumpers, are largely holding on, even if in some cases by drastically reduced margins. Heck even the not competent Pub incumbent in CA-48 in the Pub death zone (from Russia with love Dana R) is in the tossup zone for the moment. Maybe it is because he is a stoner in a place that loves recreational drugs, I don't know. The highly competent Pub Roskam in IL-06 is also a tossup in the Pub death zone.

As the only other one to post in that topic (sorry, I know how that feels), calling all the competitive races, I ended up with D+42. Personally, I think IL-06 is probably closer to Lean D. Apparently, Republicans are struggling in IL-14, which is even more Republican. Not even the Democratic gerrymander could've foreseen the changes in the Chicago suburbs and exurbs.

Anyway, I think with improving numbers, Democrats could win even more seats. If the Democratic lead in the generic ballot starts to stabilize in the low double-digits, I think Republicans are facing a catastrophic tsunami in the House and at the state level. Right now, I'll stick with a previous prediction and say a net gain of 40-55.

[bilaps]

Let's try this.

NJ 02,11 PA 05,06, 07, 17
AZ 02, CA 49, CO 06, IA 01, KS 03, MI 11, NJ 11, VA 10 Those are certain already. So that's 14 pickups but Rs have a pickup in PA 14 so that's 13.

Out of 4 competitive in MN i'm going 2-2 split which doesn't affect net pickups cause 2 are D held.
Out of 5 in CA (10,25,39,45,48) I'm going with 3-2 split which is 16.
Out of 3 in IL (06,12,14) I'm going with 1 so it's 17.
Out of 2 in FL (26,27) I'm going with 1 so it's 18.
Additionaly I give dems out of tossups MI 08, one of NJ03 or NJ 07, one of NY 19 or 22, PA 01.
So that's 24

[SN2903]

12 to 18.

[Person Man]

between 2 and 3 dozen. Closer to 3. I would say it's going to be 226-209.

[SuperCow]

15-20. Republicans retain power with about 220-225.

[Person Man]

So everyone is between 210ish and 250ish seats with a median  around 225-232?

[GeorgiaModerate]

So everyone is between 210ish and 250ish seats with a median  around 225-232?

Pretty much, with a few exceptions.  Ben Kenobi for one, who predicted the Democrats will lose 4 seats net.

[Del Tachi]

28

[MAINEiac4434]

60.

[Wisconsin+17]

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Not impossible, nor unlikely. Last time we were in a similar situation with Bush, the Rs picked up a few seats in the midterms. Right now RCP has the race as essentially tied.

Remember, this isn't a presidential election year and Rs tend to do better in the midterms.

If the Senate is going to have R pickups then we're likely to see a similar situation in the House.

I've seen polls showing they are even in the generic ballot which means that Rs will net a bunch of seats.

[Skye]

I did a map yesterday that ended up with 223 D seats, I think.

[Oryxslayer]

My prediction for a while on a seat-by-seat basis has been fluctuating around 230 D seats.

[JGibson]

Dems +32-+46 for me.

[GeorgiaModerate]

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Not impossible, nor unlikely. Last time we were in a similar situation with Bush, the Rs picked up a few seats in the midterms. Right now RCP has the race as essentially tied.

Remember, this isn't a presidential election year and Rs tend to do better in the midterms.


No, the out party tends to do better in midterms.  The last two cycles that was the Republicans.  This time it's the Democrats.

If the Senate is going to have R pickups then we're likely to see a similar situation in the House.

This is a totally unjustified assumption.  They're not on equivalent playing fields.  The Senate battlegrounds are mostly in R-friendly states.  The House battleground districts are in much more D-friendly territory.

I've seen polls showing they are even in the generic ballot which means that Rs will net a bunch of seats.

You are choosing to look only at the extreme outliers in the range.  There have also been polls with D+15, D+16, etc., which are just as likely to be correct as the ones that are even -- i.e., not at all likely.  The truth will be somewhere near the average, or D+8 plus or minus a couple points.  IF the generic ballot was truly even, then yes the R's would likely gain.  But nobody really believes it's close to even; if you believe that, you are engaging in extremely wishful thinking.

(My inline comments in red.)

I don't mean this unkindly, but you should really stop posting analysis like this.  You're only embarrassing yourself.

[Wisconsin+17]

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I'm reminded of the quote, "If everyone thinks the same, than someone isn't thinking."

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In a turnout model, the Rs tend to do better in midterms than in presidential election years. In the gridlock model, the out party does tend to do better, but the last time we were in a similar situation, the R's picked up a few seats. These two effects need to be balanced against each other.

I personally think the bias is more towards stability than instability. People are more likely to keep their congressmen. We don't have a large issue that would cause people to dramatically shift things, and incumbency is a large factor too.

I'm confident that my prediction is much closer than most here, especially when the next closest is D+12, and the bias indicated on this site is so fiercely tilted.

The Kav issue isn't helping the D's in the slightest either. 

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According to whom? These seats were won in 2016 which was hardly a R wave election. I hear it being said, but the only analysis that I am seeing using the generic ballot.

The last analysis I've seen shows that the generic is a sh**tty measure because of localization issues. If you have deepest of deep blue seats trending D, then that's going to affect a measure that looks at the numbers nationally. Locally, among the sample of 'tossups', the electorate has trended R, which is a good sign on election day.

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The behavior I've seen here whenever a poll contradicts 'established knowledge' is to label the poll an 'extreme outlier'. That's not a particularly useful approach. 

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My first argument wasn't, "I believe the race to be X", but rather "I've seen some polls with the generic at even". I didn't even suggest that I thought the true value of the Generic to be even, all I said is that there's some evidence out there that the Rs are actually doing not too bad. R's don't need a generic even ballot to keep their seats, and win a few, D+3 would be sufficient.

And that is hardly something that is impossible to see.

But do go on.

[GeorgiaModerate]

The behavior I've seen here whenever a poll contradicts 'established knowledge' is to label the poll an 'extreme outlier'. That's not a particularly useful approach.  

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My first argument wasn't, "I believe the race to be X", but rather "I've seen some polls with the generic at even". I didn't even suggest that I thought the true value of the Generic to be even, all I said is that there's some evidence out there that the Rs are actually doing not too bad. R's don't need a generic even ballot to keep their seats, and win a few, D+3 would be sufficient.

And that is hardly something that is impossible to see.

But do go on.

I'm not saying the tied GCB polls are outliers because they contradict the general wisdom.  I say they are outliers because I looked at the actual data.  Looking at the GCB polls in the 538 database that include periods since August 1 (we could pick some other starting point and it wouldn't change the picture significantly), there are 97 polls.  They break down as:


D+14 4
D+13 5
D+12 3
D+11 7
D+10 5
D+9 9
D+8 14
D+7 12
D+6 9
D+5 10
D+4 7
D+3 4
D+2 3
Tie 4
R+3 1

With this data set, the four ties and the one R+3 are outliers BY DEFINITION, as are the ones at the other end of the range, as I noted in my previous response.  (FWIW, 3 of the ties and the R+3 were in August.)  Citing the outliers -- on either end -- is a very weak point in favor of an argument.

[Wisconsin+17]

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Two things. One, not all the polls measure the same thing. You're looking at a dataset that has polls (by your own admission), that are spread out over 10 weeks.

This is why you're getting such high standard deviations in your sample, and why your sample isn't going to give you a good estimate of the current median.

If you wanted to do this properly, you'd confine it to 2 weeks, not 10 weeks and then try to estimate your outliers.

You need to be cautious with that. It's not normally distributed.

[Kyle Rittenhouse is a Political Prisoner]

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Two things. One, not all the polls measure the same thing. You're looking at a dataset that has polls (by your own admission), that are spread out over 10 weeks.

This is why you're getting such high standard deviations in your sample, and why your sample isn't going to give you a good estimate of the current median.

If you wanted to do this properly, you'd confine it to 2 weeks, not 10 weeks and then try to estimate your outliers.

You need to be cautious with that. It's not normally distributed.

Given that there has been no significant change in the average, that's a pointless objection. You don't get to play high and mighty about technicalities when you've just said a number of unbelievably stupid things.

[GeorgiaModerate]

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Two things. One, not all the polls measure the same thing. You're looking at a dataset that has polls (by your own admission), that are spread out over 10 weeks.

This is why you're getting such high standard deviations in your sample, and why your sample isn't going to give you a good estimate of the current median.

If you wanted to do this properly, you'd confine it to 2 weeks, not 10 weeks and then try to estimate your outliers.

You need to be cautious with that. It's not normally distributed.

If we look at the last two weeks it does not significantly alter the situation, and actually includes only one tie and no R+ polls.  I deliberately went back far enough to include multiple ties, since you mentioned polls (plural) that showed an even ballot.

If you are confident that R's will gain seats, how about a friendly wager on it?  Specifically, if the D's end up with fewer than 195 total House seats, I'll change my avatar to match your current one until the end of November.  But if they end up with 195 or more, you change your avatar to I-GA for the same period.  Agreed?

[Wisconsin+17]

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Well, if I assume that it is a normal distribution (which it isn't, since it isn't tailing off properly), then the 4 even polls are about 5 percent of the total and within two standard deviations.

Which means you can't simply 'throw them out' as an outlier. So pick your poison there. As it is the entire sample is pretty worthless since it includes numbers from August.

[Wisconsin+17]

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Yeah, just that going back that far ruins your sample.

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Nah. You take the atlas aggregate with the over and I'll take the under.

[OSR stands with Israel]

27

[Lachi]

40-45

[GeorgiaModerate]

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Yeah, just that going back that far ruins your sample.

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Nah. You take the atlas aggregate with the over and I'll take the under.

Nah, there are some predictions on the high end that are even more unlikely than yours (there's a D+153, IIRC).  How about which of our predictions is closest?  We're both on record in the thread, you at R+4 and me at D+42.  The average of those is D+19.  Want to go over/under on that?  (Exactly D+19 would be a push.)

[Duke of York]

I predict about 40