Monday, June 7, 2010

Census 2020: Will it look the same?

While this year's Census was a huge boost for postal revenues, don't look for the same kind of bump 10 years from now when the 2020 count rolls out.

Officials are already looking at alternatives.

The Washington Post interviewed Census Bureau Director Robert Groves who said, "None of us can imagine doing a 2020 Census without an Internet option."

Canada used an Internet option a couple of years ago and only had an 18 percent response rate.

Read the article here and tell us what you think. Is using the Internet a bad idea for accurately and securely counting Americans?  Comment here.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Something should change. None of the residents in this post office got census forms. I am a box only PO. We sent every form back as instructed. By the next count, there will be more people on line, and wish to be counted. The best way is still door to door by census takers.

Anonymous said...

I'm always amazed at the number of people who put 100% trust in the internet. There's still too much chance for fraud on the web. I'm sure an internet option will be used for the next census, as it will cut costs, but I agree that door-to-door would be more accurate. I think the mail option worked well, but my PO box customers were frustrated. Not enough communication by the Census Bureau as to how these people would be counted.

Francis said...

If we are not prepared for 2020 Census and surprised we were not for 2010, we are doomed to fail. We can use the same mechanism's we used now but provide alternatives like those who did not respond we have option to go to internet and do it but with a service fee anytime and door to door with a late fee but census should not be closed until every person and address is accounted for. We should take full responsibility of doing it by mail,door to door and or internet until every address and person in US is accounted for. Time is still there if there are gaps in this process before someone can lobby they can do better Job than us.

Anonymous said...

The blog states "only 18% response rate"...but if that's 18% of 5 million people...that is still nearly a million people responding! One million less census forms in our mail stream.