Rob Santos, Urban Institute's senior methodologist, answers five questions about the 2010 Census. With an immigration increase in the first half of the decade and a housing crisis and recession in the second, the country has experienced some major population shifts since the last census. Santos discusses what trends we can expect and what challenges lie ahead for the Census Bureau.
April 21, 2010
1. What will be the big stories coming out of the 2010 Census?
I think the big story is going to be the diversity of the United States. The decennial census and the American Community Survey will show that we are once again an immigrant population. One striking thing will be how much immigrant children will account for future population growth.
The other big story will be the effects of the housing market bust and the economic downturn. I think we'll see some interesting population shifts. The recession changed the homeowner vs. renter ratio and the historical trends of population movement in the United States. For decades, Florida and California kept growing, but over the past five years, people have been leaving those states. Las Vegas had the highest population growth over the past 10 years, but is now experiencing an exodus.
Another surprise we may see is the accuracy of the count. The 2000 Census was called the most accurate decennial census ever, but really white households were overcounted and minorities were undercounted, and the two happened to cancel each other out. This year, for the first time, the Census Bureau is attempting to separately measure both the undercount and the overcount, not just the net error. The magnitude of the overcounting, double counting, and undercounting for certain populations may be a surprise.
2. What effect will the housing crisis and the recession have on census counting?
"Perhaps the Bureau could be daring enough to develop a measure of race and ethnicity based on the perspectives held by the population…. We're still trying to force square pegs into round holes, so we're not there yet."
The economic downturn caught those preparing for the census off guard. The high rate of unemployment and foreclosures are expected to create different housing situations—more people doubling up or in transient situations. We may see misreporting due to high housing instability or undercounting because people may not know whether to count someone temporarily residing in their home.
Census preparations started about five years ago so, by and large, the operations were set years before the economic downturn, during a time of booming homeownership, especially among minorities and immigrants. The Census Bureau needs to be nimble enough to pick up on recession-driven undercounting. I'm hoping the wonderful campaigns, outreach, and partnership efforts will be enough to overcome that confusion. I'm cautiously optimistic it will, but the jury is out until the census concludes and can be evaluated.
3. What should the Census Bureau do to better count historically undercounted groups?
The Census Bureau has made some really good media outreach efforts. The Superbowl commercial got some criticism, but I think the Bureau did well to target young adults who may have dismissed the census as unimportant. The Bureau also reached out to Spanish language media and other non-English-language media. It even built the census into telenovelas—the soap operas on Spanish-language channels. Everyday folks watch these shows and they'll see characters they relate to actually fill out the census forms. The Bureau also made some solid partnerships across the country to reach out to undercounted populations.
That said, there aren't any magic bullets. It's going to take a lot of hard work to get an accurate count. It's pretty easy to get the first 50 percent of households and then it's harder to get the next 10 percent, and so on. It takes an enormous effort to convince the last 5 percent to participate. You really have to tailor your methods to all the different groups and expend a lot of resources to count those hard-to-reach groups. That's why the Bureau is so focused on securing inexpensive mail returns.
4. What's the harm in undercounting?
First, it defies the spirit of the Constitution. We need to count everyone. There are two principal ways the census is used. One is redistricting. If you don't count a district's population properly, you can't accurately determine congressional representation. The second is for allocating federal funds. Billions of dollars are provided on the basis of population. An accurate count is necessary for everything from food stamps and school lunch programs to funding for firehouses and police stations. Much of that funding helps high-risk groups, like low-income families, that have been historically undercounted.
Some groups believe that undocumented immigrants need not be counted because they don't vote and there's a perception that they take resources away from the rest of the population. But—the fact is—a sizeable chunk of the national population are U.S. citizen children of undocumented immigrants. And the Constitution doesn't distinguish between documented and undocumented residents, so just from a constitutional perspective, everyone should be counted. From another perspective, undocumented immigrants for generations have contributed significantly to our economy, whether people want to admit it or not. On that basis alone, we should count them.
5. What other challenges are ahead for the Census Bureau?
The trick for the 2020 Census will be using the web and other new technologies sensibly and efficiently. Maybe 50 or 60 percent of the population by then will be amenable to filling out an online census form. Others will still need to be reached by the traditional pencil-paper method or a visit by a census worker. The trick will be testing the best methods for easier-to-get populations and developing tailored approaches for the more difficult-to-reach populations.
Another challenge for the Bureau is coming up with more culturally sensitive approaches to engaging the population. The race/ethnicity question is a classic example. They are never going to get that right if they keep thinking about race and ethnicity from a scholarly perspective. More ethnographic research might help the Bureau understand how people think about their own race and ethnicity and what different cultures' racial and ethnic constructs are. Perhaps the Bureau could be daring enough to develop a measure of race and ethnicity based on the perspectives held by the population, but still map them back to historical constructs of separate race and Hispanic origin.
The United States is increasingly a diverse, multiethnic society, so we have to learn to think differently about how we measure race and ethnicity. We're still trying to force square pegs into round holes, so we're not there yet.
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