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It’s not. A census literally counts every individual. Census public reports are aggregated for privacy. This is about spatial disaggregation of aggregated cen

by aoki 2y ago

It’s not. A census literally counts every individual. Census public reports are aggregated for privacy. This is about spatial disaggregation of aggregated census data. The problem in developing countries (which is what these datasets are used for) is that they often fail to run a complete census (in some cases, for many decades) because it is expensive and/or the government is not functional. So these datasets may not be well-calibrated overall. The US has no problem running a decennial census, aside from nonresponse by immigrants, conspiracy theory enjoyers, etc.

mootothemax 2y ago
>A census literally counts every individual. I'm afraid that this isn't the case; a census is a best-efforts estimate. There are plenty of people missed for a variety of reason, everything from not wanting to be found, through to simple avoidance. Let alone filling out the forms incorrectly or giving dud answers to the army of amazing people trying to make sense of all the madness. Edit: realising the above has added to a long list of things that once upon a time I thought were hard-set facts, and nowadays I'm slowly losing my mind over. Coordinates, populated place boundaries, census counts + demographics... I mean, what _is_ an address? Incredibly painful to get to the bottom of that one, at least in the UK where the definition of an address will vary significantly by use case screams into the void
InitialLastName 2y ago
> A census literally counts every individual. Census public reports are aggregated for privacy. Is there any evidence of how accurately the US census actually does that job? Having spoken with a number of people who were involved with the 2020 census (mostly on a volunteer, local basis) the answer is not "absolutely every person in the country got counted exactly once". There are a number of sources of error that would seem essentially impossible to fully remediate, due to people being complicated and error-prone and the census being largely self-reported: - People in multiple households being counted twice, e.g. college students being counted both at college and at home. - People who refuse to participate (one of the census-takers I know had someone wave a gun at her face when she tried to follow up on their household's non-response). - People who are transient or disconnected enough from the social fabric that they are hard to maintain consistent contact with. I knew someone involved with taking the census for an urban unhoused population and there was no doubt that they both missed and double-counted people; I'm sure it's even more difficult for rural populations that might be even less connected and even more transient. It's not hard to imagine that, on net and despite there being rules and processes for handling each of those situations, there ends up being regional and/or urban/rural bias in the final counts.
- mootothemax 2y ago
  > Having spoken with a number of people who were involved with the 2020 census (mostly on a volunteer, local basis) the answer is not "absolutely every person in the country got counted exactly once". Do you have any thoughts on how the US census takes your insightful comment's points into account? I imagine it's got to be quite an involved process given the vast differences in US geography, kinda blows my mind thinking about even basic stuff like age demographics vs. taking into account how many people died on census day. But then - maybe that's too granular and it all balances out in the end? Or at least, it does if you use special magic sauce the US census has covered?
- DennisP 2y ago
  US rural people tend to trust the government less, so I could definitely see them getting undercounted. The census should really have an option for refusers that collects an absolute minimum of information. The Constitution only asks that people be counted, not that they be broken down into categories. At least it's just the short form now. Prior to 2010, one out of six people got the long form, which had ten pages of questions for each person in the household. Here's a pdf: https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/programs-surveys/decennial/technical-documentation/questionnaires/2000_long_form.pdf https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/programs-surveys/d...
  - Braxton1980 2y ago
    I believe the long form survey you are talking about is the acs survey If you receive it you are legally required to respond. https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/about/top-questions-about-the-survey.html https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/about/top-questi... Considering cenus data is used to determine representation numbers just counting people could lead inflated numbers if that information can't be verified.
    - DennisP 2y ago
      It used to be a "long form" every ten years, now it's the ACS every year.[1] I didn't realize until now that they'd continued the long form in another, um, form. Technically you're required to respond, with a fine of $100 per question if you don't (with 50 questions). However, in the past half century the government has not prosecuted or fined anyone for failing to respond.[2] [1] https://www.prb.org/resources/continuity-and-change-in-the-u-s-decennial-census/ https://www.prb.org/resources/continuity-and-change-in-the-u... [2] https://www.easidemographics.com/web/do-i-have-to-complete-the-american-community-survey-acs https://www.easidemographics.com/web/do-i-have-to-complete-t...
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
Mountain_Skies 2y ago
A census worker wasn't able to get in contact with the people who lived across the street from me. They suddenly moved out one weekend during the first summer of the pandemic and never came back, leaving the house vacant. I didn't know them very well, but the census worker asked me to make my best guess about the ages of each of the adult and child who had lived there. Did that cause a double count due to them being counted wherever they moved to? Were my guesses correct? Or correct enough? No idea but that's the data the census worker recorded.
- senkora 2y ago
  The census has an official date to avoid issues like this. Since they lived at the house across the street from you on the official census date of April 1st 2020, the census worker was correct to record them at that address. They would only have been double counted if they incorrectly reported living at their new address as of April 1st.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
ericmcer 2y ago
There is just no way they count every individual. I live in California and was visiting someone in the central valley. For fun I drove some back dirt roads into some hills and there was a small corrugated sheet metal building style settlement with 20ish people hanging around it a ways back in. It really made me wonder how many people are tucked away. Not like a 24 year old kid who gets a college degree and intentionally lives off grid, but poor/uneducated people who eke out a living somewhere off the beaten path.

by aoki 2y ago

mootothemax 2y ago

>A census literally counts every individual. I'm afraid that this isn't the case; a census is a best-efforts estimate. There are plenty of people missed for a variety of reason, everything from not wanting to be found, through to simple avoidance. Let alone filling out the forms incorrectly or giving dud answers to the army of amazing people trying to make sense of all the madness. Edit: realising the above has added to a long list of things that once upon a time I thought were hard-set facts, and nowadays I'm slowly losing my mind over. Coordinates, populated place boundaries, census counts + demographics... I mean, what _is_ an address? Incredibly painful to get to the bottom of that one, at least in the UK where the definition of an address will vary significantly by use case screams into the void

InitialLastName 2y ago

> A census literally counts every individual. Census public reports are aggregated for privacy. Is there any evidence of how accurately the US census actually does that job? Having spoken with a number of people who were involved with the 2020 census (mostly on a volunteer, local basis) the answer is not "absolutely every person in the country got counted exactly once". There are a number of sources of error that would seem essentially impossible to fully remediate, due to people being complicated and error-prone and the census being largely self-reported: - People in multiple households being counted twice, e.g. college students being counted both at college and at home. - People who refuse to participate (one of the census-takers I know had someone wave a gun at her face when she tried to follow up on their household's non-response). - People who are transient or disconnected enough from the social fabric that they are hard to maintain consistent contact with. I knew someone involved with taking the census for an urban unhoused population and there was no doubt that they both missed and double-counted people; I'm sure it's even more difficult for rural populations that might be even less connected and even more transient. It's not hard to imagine that, on net and despite there being rules and processes for handling each of those situations, there ends up being regional and/or urban/rural bias in the final counts.

mootothemax 2y ago
> Having spoken with a number of people who were involved with the 2020 census (mostly on a volunteer, local basis) the answer is not "absolutely every person in the country got counted exactly once". Do you have any thoughts on how the US census takes your insightful comment's points into account? I imagine it's got to be quite an involved process given the vast differences in US geography, kinda blows my mind thinking about even basic stuff like age demographics vs. taking into account how many people died on census day. But then - maybe that's too granular and it all balances out in the end? Or at least, it does if you use special magic sauce the US census has covered?
DennisP 2y ago
US rural people tend to trust the government less, so I could definitely see them getting undercounted. The census should really have an option for refusers that collects an absolute minimum of information. The Constitution only asks that people be counted, not that they be broken down into categories. At least it's just the short form now. Prior to 2010, one out of six people got the long form, which had ten pages of questions for each person in the household. Here's a pdf: https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/programs-surveys/decennial/technical-documentation/questionnaires/2000_long_form.pdf https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/programs-surveys/d...
- Braxton1980 2y ago
  I believe the long form survey you are talking about is the acs survey If you receive it you are legally required to respond. https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/about/top-questions-about-the-survey.html https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/about/top-questi... Considering cenus data is used to determine representation numbers just counting people could lead inflated numbers if that information can't be verified.
  - DennisP 2y ago
    It used to be a "long form" every ten years, now it's the ACS every year.[1] I didn't realize until now that they'd continued the long form in another, um, form. Technically you're required to respond, with a fine of $100 per question if you don't (with 50 questions). However, in the past half century the government has not prosecuted or fined anyone for failing to respond.[2] [1] https://www.prb.org/resources/continuity-and-change-in-the-u-s-decennial-census/ https://www.prb.org/resources/continuity-and-change-in-the-u... [2] https://www.easidemographics.com/web/do-i-have-to-complete-the-american-community-survey-acs https://www.easidemographics.com/web/do-i-have-to-complete-t...

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

Mountain_Skies 2y ago

A census worker wasn't able to get in contact with the people who lived across the street from me. They suddenly moved out one weekend during the first summer of the pandemic and never came back, leaving the house vacant. I didn't know them very well, but the census worker asked me to make my best guess about the ages of each of the adult and child who had lived there. Did that cause a double count due to them being counted wherever they moved to? Were my guesses correct? Or correct enough? No idea but that's the data the census worker recorded.

senkora 2y ago
The census has an official date to avoid issues like this. Since they lived at the house across the street from you on the official census date of April 1st 2020, the census worker was correct to record them at that address. They would only have been double counted if they incorrectly reported living at their new address as of April 1st.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

ericmcer 2y ago

There is just no way they count every individual. I live in California and was visiting someone in the central valley. For fun I drove some back dirt roads into some hills and there was a small corrugated sheet metal building style settlement with 20ish people hanging around it a ways back in. It really made me wonder how many people are tucked away. Not like a 24 year old kid who gets a college degree and intentionally lives off grid, but poor/uneducated people who eke out a living somewhere off the beaten path.