3/1/10, Joe Rodriguez, http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_14496207?source=most_viewed&nclick_check=1
Dr. Grove's Introduction to need for the census http://2010.census.gov/2010census/how/index.php
2010 census: 10 questions, 10 minutes, here's the questions and explanation why these questions are asked http://2010.census.gov/2010census/how/interactive-form.php
1. Number of people in your household
2. Any people you didn't include in question #1?
3. Own, rent, or occupy without rent payment?
4. Your telephone number
5. Name each person living in household, beginning with owner, if not owner any adult-- this is person #1 referred to below.
6. Is person #1 Male or Female?
7. Age and date of birth of person #1?
8. Is person #1 of Hispanic origin, if so designate type.
9. Race of person #1?
10. Does person #1 sometimes live or stay somewhere else?
Commentary opinion from this citizen. No way its going to take 10 minutes to answer these questions, but considering the communication improvements since 1790 doesn't it seem more reasonable to find a better, faster, more cost effective, improved method of collecting "economy and society" data. Cities and Counties already have much of this kind of information, and although the example online questionaire states "the form can not be filled out on line", hopefully online is part of the near future.
Now three (3) centuries later, given communication improvements, the land expansion and population explosion, why is 10 years a significant, isolated landmark time-period, rather than just another year in annual or other periodic information comparisons? And, why not collect such information the modern way through encrypted, verifiable email with immediately crunched numbers, and focus separately on those who cannot or will not participate?
Posted by Kathy Meeh
1 comment:
Do you know anyone who can generate an encrypted, verifiable email?
I do, but most of the people I know don't even understand how their email works. Most people wouldn't have a clue about digital signatures, certificate authorities, chains of trust, etc... And the Census needs to include every single person, technoliterate or not.
Given the stakes, I'd much rather the Census send people out to talk to people face to face. It's much harder to hack.
Is there some problem that you hope to fix by introducing technology into the census?
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