Reply #30: A bad assumption

[mulethree]

On average, the Triad counties have 38% the population of the non-triad counties.

So instead of 2,486 * 41 = 101926
It should be more like 2486 * 41 * 0.378 = 38,527

0.378 = 2833863/7497225 = Triad votes / non-triad votes

I ran numbers for triad vs non-triad and found :
Kerry got 106% of expected in non-triad counties and 102.3% in triad counties.
Bush got 100.5% of expected in non-triad counties and 103.8% in triad counties.

All the numbers are >100% because the many 3rd party votes from 2000 are not accounted for.

If you took the non-triad percentages and applied them to the triad counties then Bush would lose 25,000 votes and Kerry would pick up 25,000 votes.

The non-triad counties are larger and include more urban areas and minorities, so there are plausible explanations. I think a more valid comparison would be to pick two sets of demographically-comparable counties and compare the two subsets.

If I restrict the comparison to counties with <100,000 votes
Triad Kerry= 102% Bush = 104.1%
non-Triad Kerry=102.9% Bush=103.3%

If I restrict the comparison to counties with <50,000 votes
Triad Kerry= 101.5% Bush = 104.5%
non-Triad Kerry=102.3% Bush=103.9%

If I restrict the comparison to counties with <25,000 votes
Triad Kerry= 101% Bush = 104.2%
non-Triad Kerry=98.7% Bush=105.1%