Census experts puzzled by high rate of unanswered questions

[Elderberry]

AP By MIKE SCHNEIDER August 8, 2021

Census Bureau statisticians and outside experts are trying to unravel a mystery: Why were so many questions about households in the 2020 census left unanswered?

Residents did not respond to a multitude of questions about sex, race, Hispanic background, family relationships and age, even when providing a count of the number of people living in the home, according to documents released by the agency. Statisticians had to fill in the gaps.

Reflecting an early stage in the number crunching, the documents show that 10% to 20% of questions were not answered in the 2020 census, depending on the question and state. According to the Census Bureau, later phases of processing show the actual rates were lower.

The rates have averaged 1% to 3% in 170 years of previous U.S. censuses, according to University of Minnesota demographer Steven Ruggles.

The information is important because data with demographic details will be used for drawing congressional and legislative districts. That data, which the Census Bureau will release Thursday, also is used to distribute $1.5 trillion in federal spending each year.

More: https://apnews.com/article/technology-health-coronavirus-pandemic-census-2020-5e0dd5b710f1ab0ff23a8272078d5528

[240B]

The answer is simple. Nobody trusts the government about anything.
No matter what they promise or what they say.
They are out for money and power. They will use any information you give them to that end.

[GtHawk]

Does it really matter? People probably believe:

A. It's really none of the governments business.

B. They don't trust the government (ample evidence)

C. The government will find a way to use their answers against them.

D. The government will just make up the information no matter what the answers are.
 

[skeeter]

I'd like to think that that many people understand what the census was originally intended to accomplish, and realize it doesn't square with what goobermint busybodies in the bureaucracy are asking them today.

Todays census seems to primarily be means to determine, to the giggling delight of lard assed bureaucrats, how much further the 'white' majority has diminished over the past ten years.

[unite for individuality]

Residents did not respond to a multitude of questions about sex, race, Hispanic background, family relationships and age, even when providing a count of the number of people living in the home, according to documents released by the agency. Statisticians had to fill in the gaps.

...

The information is important because data with demographic details will be used for drawing congressional and legislative districts. That data, which the Census Bureau will release Thursday, also is used to distribute $1.5 trillion in federal spending each year.

The only data that is needed to draw congressional districts is - how many people live in each county/city/etc.

The only use for demographic data in drawing congressional districts is for gerrymandering.

[240B]

The only use for demographic data in drawing congressional districts is for gerrymandering.

Check out these crazy 'districts'. The politicians conduct polls to see who is most likely to vote for them. Then they annex to their district whichever strips or slivers or any absurd shape that gives them personally the most voters. So instead of a logical grid, we wind up with insanity like this.

[Kamaji]

Other than my name, household members, and residence, the rest of that information is "Nunya" and the government isn't entitled to it.

[mountaineer]

The only data that is needed to draw congressional districts is - how many people live in each county/city/etc.

The only use for demographic data in drawing congressional districts is for gerrymandering.

[DefiantMassRINO]

The only requirement for Census is to count.

What is a Hispanic?  Someone from Spain or Portugal?  Someone from a former Spanish or Portuguese colony?  Someone descended from someone from Spain, Portugal, or one of their former colonies?  If someone is of mixed heritage, at what % he/she no longer qualifies as "Hispanic"?  What is the staus of someone with a "Hispanic" surname, but mostly of other heritage?  If I take a DNA test that determines I am .0025% Iberian, am I "Hispanic"?

Is Cameron Diaz a "Hispanic"?

What about the Hungarian surname, "Varga", that sounds "Hispanic"?

What about descendents of Spanish Jews who emigrated to the Americas?  Are they Hispanic or Jewish?

To which breed of human would the Westchester Kennel Club classify me?

Ironically, all this liberal racial categorization devolves into eugenics.

[skeeter]

The only requirement for Census is to count.

What is a Hispanic?  Someone from Spain or Portugal?  Someone from a former Spanish or Portuguese colony?  Someone descended from someone from Spain, Portugal, or one of their former colonies?  If someone is of mixed heritage, at what % he/she no longer qualifies as "Hispanic"?  What is the staus of someone with a "Hispanic" surname, but mostly of other heritage?  If I take a DNA test that determines I am .0025% Iberian, am I "Hispanic"?

Is Cameron Diaz a "Hispanic"?

What about the Hungarian surname, "Varga", that sounds "Hispanic"?

What about descendents of Spanish Jews who emigrated to the Americas?  Are they Hispanic or Jewish?

To which breed of human would the Westchester Kennel Club classify me?

Ironically, all this liberal racial categorization devolves into eugenics.

Don't tell any leftists you know but before 1968 hispanics were counted as white.

[PeteS in CA]

The word for the day is "Nacho", as in Nacho business! 

[sneakypete]

The answer is simple. Nobody trusts the government about anything.
 

@240B

I think it might be simpler than that. We now have man,MANY 'murikan citzuns wad kant reed or rite dat stil be habin diplomia,n' Bush.

Not to mention millions of new American citizens that can't read,write,or speak English.

Since none of these people can read or write and don't want to get in trouble with the goobermint for not returning a goobermint document,they send them back incomplete.

Unless you are dealing with the vile creatures known as "politicians",the simplest answer is usually the right one.

[sneakypete]

I'd like to think that that many people understand what the census was originally intended to accomplish, and realize it doesn't square with what goobermint busybodies in the bureaucracy are asking them today.

"Todays census seems to primarily be means to determine, to the giggling delight of lard assed bureaucrats, how much further the 'white' majority has diminished over the past ten years."

@skeeter

You do have a very good point!

[sneakypete]

The only requirement for Census is to count.

What is a Hispanic?   

@DefiantMassRINO

In America it means someone who is mostly American Indian and ashamed of it,so they try to claim their ancestors were Castilian Dons so white you could see throught them.


Kinda like so many blacks were going around in America claiming they were the direct descendants of Nubian Kings who whose ancestors were kidnapped by the debbil white mans and brought here as slaves.


And really,given the history of Mexico and how white people were considered to be direct descendants of GAWD and the local Indians were disposable trash,it's hard to criticize them.

MOST of the so-called "Hispanics" I have known got over that crap a couple of generations ago,but the truly stoopid still hang on to it as a way to getting the big bucks for doing and knowing nothing.

[sneakypete]

Don't tell any leftists you know but before 1968 hispanics were counted as white.

@skeeter

Probably not a good idea to tell that to any young adult His or Her Panics,either.

[sneakypete]

The word for the day is "Nacho", as in Nacho business! 

@PeteS in CA

Don't forget about his sister,"Nuna yo bidnez".

[240B]

I think it might be simpler than that. We now have man,MANY 'murikan citzuns wad kant reed or rite dat stil be habin diplomia,n' Bush.
Not to mention millions of new American citizens that can't read,write,or speak English.

They sent a guy to my door. He read off the questions one by one, because according to him "I had not responded to questionnaires".

I told him my name age, race, I am not gay, and that was all. He was stepping backwards because he viewed me as 'hostile', and asked why I will not answer any more questions. I said, "That is all you need to know."

Also, if someone is really super-dooper motivated (which equals nobody), there is a number to call to get the questions in any language.

The wierd part is, the government/NSA/Amazon/Google already know every detail about your life. They already have the information they are asking for. I think the census is primarily to weed out illegals and people 'off the grid'. They have all the information they could ever want about everyone else. And if you think those census people do not have you on video, then you are naïve and wrong.

[GtHawk]

The only requirement for Census is to count.

What is a Hispanic?  Someone from Spain or Portugal?  Someone from a former Spanish or Portuguese colony?  Someone descended from someone from Spain, Portugal, or one of their former colonies?  If someone is of mixed heritage, at what % he/she no longer qualifies as "Hispanic"?  What is the staus of someone with a "Hispanic" surname, but mostly of other heritage?  If I take a DNA test that determines I am .0025% Iberian, am I "Hispanic"?

Is Cameron Diaz a "Hispanic"?

What about the Hungarian surname, "Varga", that sounds "Hispanic"?

What about descendents of Spanish Jews who emigrated to the Americas?  Are they Hispanic or Jewish?

To which breed of human would the Westchester Kennel Club classify me?

Ironically, all this liberal racial categorization devolves into eugenics.

I won't even tell you how many times my healthcare group or banks, etc. send me emails and mail in Spanish because somehow their stupid data base identifies my Hungarian name as Hispanic. Little did I know I should have let them believe it so as to get preferential treatment.

[sneakypete]

I won't even tell you how many times my healthcare group or banks, etc. send me emails and mail in Spanish because somehow their stupid data base identifies my Hungarian name as Hispanic. Little did I know I should have let them believe it so as to get preferential treatment.

@GtHawk

Probably cost you tens of thousands of dollars over the years.

AND........,chances are it became a "Mexican name" because decades ago some Hungarian immigrated to Mexico and married a Mexican woman. After a few generations,it IS a "Mexican name" in Mexico.

[240B]

I won't even tell you how many times my healthcare group or banks, etc. send me emails and mail in Spanish

@GtHawk
Not as unusual as you might think. I receive Spanish stuff all the time, and my name is German.
In America today, Spanish language is becoming as common as English.

[Elderberry]

The only requirement for Census is to count.

What is a Hispanic?  Someone from Spain or Portugal?  Someone from a former Spanish or Portuguese colony?  Someone descended from someone from Spain, Portugal, or one of their former colonies?  If someone is of mixed heritage, at what % he/she no longer qualifies as "Hispanic"?  What is the staus of someone with a "Hispanic" surname, but mostly of other heritage?  If I take a DNA test that determines I am .0025% Iberian, am I "Hispanic"?

Is Cameron Diaz a "Hispanic"?

What about the Hungarian surname, "Varga", that sounds "Hispanic"?

What about descendents of Spanish Jews who emigrated to the Americas?  Are they Hispanic or Jewish?

To which breed of human would the Westchester Kennel Club classify me?

Ironically, all this liberal racial categorization devolves into eugenics.

Who is Hispanic?

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/09/15/who-is-hispanic/

Debates over who is Hispanic and who is not have fueled conversations about identity among Americans who trace their heritage to Latin America or Spain. The question surfaced during U.S. presidential debates and the confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court. More recently, it bubbled up after a singer from Spain won the “Best Latin” award at the 2019 Video Music Awards.

So, who is considered Hispanic in the United States? And how are they counted in public opinion surveys, voter exit polls and government surveys such as the 2020 census?

The most common approach to answering these questions is straightforward: Who is Hispanic? Anyone who says they are. And nobody who says they aren’t.

The U.S. Census Bureau uses this approach, as does Pew Research Center and most other research organizations that conduct public opinion surveys. By this way of counting, the Census Bureau estimates there were roughly 60.6 million Hispanics in the United States as of July 1, 2019, making up 18% of the total national population.

[mountaineer]

I answered some sort of online survey yesterday and referred to myself as Caucasian and Native American. Not that I have any "American Indian" blood, but since I was born in the U.S., I consider myself a native. 

[skeeter]

@skeeter

Probably not a good idea to tell that to any young adult His or Her Panics,either.

@sneakypete  Half the hispanics in this country self identify as white. Its Bush's newest 'little brown ones', and of course hispanic college coeds, who most likely do not.

[sneakypete]

@sneakypete  Half the hispanics in this country self identify as white. Its Bush's newest 'little brown ones', and of course hispanic college coeds, who most likely do not.

@skeeter

Only because the left has taught them to believe they vick-tums ob racism.

I have got to be honest,here. I grew up in a city with the black section of town only a block away,and had great good fun as an child of 8 to 10 or so,meeting the black kids at the city storage yard for gravel a block or two away,and using the "N word" and throwing rocks at them.

I can't remember at this late date what the current slur for kracka was back then,but I am certain the black kids had just as much fun calling us by that name,and throwing rocks at us.

It's just the kind of stupid crap that kids do,and didn't mean a thing.

By the time I was 17 and joined the army everybody was just people to me,with some being different colors than others. Of course I knew and understood there were cultural differences,but I truly didn't give a squat. If you treated me good,I treated you good. If you treated me bad,I tried to teach you the error of your ways,and your skin color was irrelevant.

[libertybele]

I answered some sort of online survey yesterday and referred to myself as Caucasian and Native American. Not that I have any "American Indian" blood, but since I was born in the U.S., I consider myself a native. 

For the longest time I didn't fill out the census and then I was sent a letter telling me that they were going to fine me!