Mixed Race Studies

One More Census Takeaway: The End of an Era of Counting the Nation?

The New York Times
2022-03-12

Michael Wines, National Correspondent

Some experts are arguing that it’s time for the census to aggressively make use of government data and other sources to augment its own decennial count.

WASHINGTON — Beyond the reports of undercounts and overcounts in population totals, there is another takeaway from the post-mortem of 2020 census data issued on Thursday: This could be the last census of its kind.

The next census will be taken in a nation where Amazon may have a better handle on where many people live than the Census Bureau itself. For some advocates of a more accurate count, the era in which census-takers knock on millions of doors to persuade people to fill out forms should give way in 2030 to a sleeker approach: data mining, surveys, sophisticated statistical projections and, if politics allows, even help from the nation’s tech giants and their endless petabytes of personal information.

The Census Bureau itself has yet to leap very far into that new era. But it has hinted recently at a “blended” approach in which official census figures could be supplemented with reliable data from government records and other sources…

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The Head of the Census Resigned. It Could Be as Serious as James Comey

TIME
2017-05-12

Haley Sweetland Edwards

John Thompson, Director, U.S. Census Bureau U.S. Census Bureau

In a week dominated by President Trump’s firing of FBI director James Comey, you could be forgiven for missing the imminent departure of another, less prominent federal official.

Yet the news this week that John H. Thompson, the director of the Census Bureau, has abruptly resigned is arguably as consequential to the future of our democracy. That’s because the Census Bureau, while less flashy than the FBI, plays a staggeringly important role in both U.S. elections and an array of state and federal government functions.

“At the very heart of the Census is nothing less than political power and money,” said Terri Ann Lowenthal, who served as the staff director of the House census oversight subcommittee before becoming a consultant on census policy and operational issues. “It is the basis, the very foundation, of our democracy and the Constitution’s promise of equal representation.”

The results of the decennial Census—the next will be in 2020—will determine how state and federal political districts are drawn; which Americans are “counted” for representation; and how federal dollars, many of which are allocated on a per capita basis, are spent…

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