Census

There is quite a mood of pessimism around about the likelihood of a good response to the Census, which cannot be helped by the formidable-looking form which many must find daunting.

Then there is the clearly recognised problem of whether it is even possible to attempt to number the people on a single day in a modern society where nobody ever stands still, not just geographically but socially & in their personal relationships – a problem which may have contributed to the alleged undercounting of the population of New York in last year’s US census.

I have not been terribly impressed by the official poster campaign – fill in your Census form & help plan local services – that’s a policy or political argument for prioritising the expenditure. You don’t need statistics to make decisions about how to spend (or cut) money on services – I could make them right here, right now - & you would have a hard time proving that decisions based on Census statistics are better than my kind. Does anyone really believe that any mistakes made in the late 1970s were caused by the late cancellation of the 1976 census?

It strikes me that one reason why a recent survey found that a large percentage of the population does not even realise that a census is necessary to count how many people live in this country is that they no longer know the story of ‘the first census’, the one that took Joseph & Mary to Bethlehem. As children the link was made explicit for us, so that the modern census linked us to the birth of Jesus.

But then perhaps it’s just as well that today’s children don’t know the King James’s version: And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed*.

In retrospect it might have been better to present the Census as a real Big Society project, rather than an expensive way of collecting data that companies like Experian (a credit reference agency) supposedly already have.

The census is a collaborative effort to paint a statistical picture, a snapshot, of how we live now. In return for our cooperation we get a guarantee of 100 years of confidentiality for our individual personal details, which will then however be released to give those who come after us invaluable information about their forebears, the history of the house they live in, their neighbourhood, & even the domestic details of the lives of our celebrities.

Our census this year was done & dusted on line. It was a pleasant experience – ONS have shown that they can produce a really clear & well designed web site when they put their minds to it.

The only drawback was that I couldn’t get away with not answering the ethnic question, no box for ‘declined to answer’, so I had to use my ingenuity.

The wording of the question is interesting: Tick one box to best describe your ethnic group or background. Best in what sense? To whom or for what purpose, or in whose opinion? Can’t remember the wording last time but it is certainly different from 1991, which asked for the respondent’s own opinion. That of course is unsatisfactory, if we are hoping to get an insight into the extent of disadvantage, since discrimination depends on the observer’s assessment of ethnicity – which may be inaccurate, even bizarre.

The overall balance of the questions as usual reflects the political preoccupations of the last few years – we will have a comprehensive picture of ‘identity’ – if the response is good enough. Race, nationality, language, partnership status.

For me the most interesting change is the attempt to get at the detailed relationships within the household, recording the link of each person to all the others, instead of just to Person 1. So statisticians should not have to scratch their heads (which are wrapped in wet towels) about problems such as:

Person 1: Mr Smith, 50
Person2: Mrs Smith, 47, his wife
Person 3: Miss Smith, 18, his daughter
Person 4: Master Smith, 2, his grandson

Is Miss Smith the mother of Master Smith?

But how sad to read the detailed instructions in the nortes about how to count children who divide their time between homes.

*PS Word’s grammar checker suggests an amendment to the King James’s version. It would prefer that the entire world should be taxed.

Link
The Census Surprise in New York

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