“Polls are being used to do a job that they’re really not intended for — and they’re not as qualified for as they used to be,” said Cliff Zukin, a professor at Rutgers University and past president of the American Association for Public Opinion Research.
Zukin warned that polling has become increasingly unreliable because Americans are harder to reach — nearly half of adults are unreachable on a landline phone — and roughly nine in 10 are unwilling to participate in surveys even when pollsters manage to contact them. The declining response rates, Zukin says, create a situation in which true public feelings are more difficult than ever to discern.