Tag: Current Population Survey

A False “Falsification” Alarm

Census Project Co-Director Terri Ann LowenthalBy Terri Ann Lowenthal

It’s the first Friday in May, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) will report the unemployment rate and job growth numbers for April. The monthly jobs report is a time-honored tradition dating back to 1940. The U.S. Census Bureau collects the data in the Current Population Survey, a joint project of Census and BLS.

The labor force stats are highly anticipated, driving the stock market this way or that and providing fodder for the latest political sound bites from both sides of the aisle. But can Americans trust the numbers?

Last November, while I was assessing the damage to 2020 Census planning and ongoing American Community Survey (ACS) caused by the recent government shutdown, the New York Post’s John Crudele provided a rude awakening from my daydreams of Thanksgiving turkey and pumpkin pie. On November 19, 2013, he ran a column with the bombshell headline: “Census ‘faked’ 2012 election jobs report.” Whoosh! The allegation — that the Census Bureau, with the White House’s blessing, falsified employment numbers to boost the president’s reelection chances in 2012 — spread like wildfire among critics of the administration, with Crudele himself fanning the flames with subsequent conspiracy theories about the Census Bureau firing and rehiring 2010 Census workers to boost job creation numbers in advance of the mid-term elections. House Oversight and Government Reform Committee leaders promptly announced an investigation into the “shocking” allegations, asking the census director whether the agency’s data are “reliable, and if not, whether Census Bureau officials knowingly and intentionally fabricated the data on which they are based.”

I bit my tongue at the time; the focus of this blog and The Census Project’s work is the decennial census and related ACS. But I’m publicly putting a rhetorical period at the end of this sad story because, as the New York Post columns irresponsibly (and falsely) imply, maybe Americans shouldn’t trust any numbers emanating from the nation’s best-known statistical agency. And if people lose confidence in the Census Bureau’s integrity, maybe they’ll take a pass when the next census or survey questionnaire appears in their mailbox (or on their computer screen). (Note to conspiracy theorists: Please don’t complain when response rates in the next census come up short in your congressional district.)

Yesterday, the Commerce Department’s Office of Inspector General (IG) issued a report on its investigation into the Post-fueled allegations of systemic, widespread and politically motivated data fabrication. You can read the report, but here’s the bottom line. The IG found no evidence that the admittedly-guilty survey taker’s supervisors told him to falsify survey data. (The Census Bureau did investigate and terminate the employee who provided the “facts” for Crudele’s theory — in 2011, one year before the supposedly cooked job numbers were published!) There was no evidence that supervisors changed survey responses or tried to hide reports of data fabrication. No evidence that the Philadelphia Regional Census Office manipulated unemployment data before the 2012 presidential election. (Columnist Crudele wildly suggested that the Philadelphia regional director could be involved in such a scheme because, you know, the City of Brotherly Love is awfully close to Washington, D.C. I cannot make this stuff up.) And no evidence of widespread survey data falsification within an alleged Philly office cabal.

The inspector general did identify general weaknesses in Census Bureau procedures for detecting and preventing data falsification. I hope the agency works quickly to institute the IG’s recommendations for strengthening protocols in this area.

But don’t bother looking for a mea culpa in the New York Post. In an initial column yesterday, John Crudele proffered that Current Population Survey response rates are suffering because the census regional offices “seem reluctant to falsify the surveys,” now that the IG, Congress, and Mr. Crudele himself are watching. At 7:19 p.m., he posted a response to the IG’s report. Surprise! The columnist accused the inspector general of a “whitewash” and called for a special prosecutor to investigate the investigation.

Hey, when a thoroughly independent review doesn’t reach the conclusions you’ve already insisted are true, the only recourse is to keep investigating until someone agrees with you! Some people just haven’t met a conspiracy theory they’re willing to give up. The rest of my fellow Americans should look beyond the sensational headlines and have confidence that the foundation of our democratic system of governance and the tools for an informed electorate — both the envy of much of the world — are in good hands.

‘Tis the Season (It’s Budget Time Again!)

Census Project Co-Director Terri Ann LowenthalBy Terri Ann Lowenthal

It’s appropriations season! Which wouldn’t merit a chuckle except, doesn’t it seem like appropriations season is year-round now? Maybe it’s just me.

This gives me a chance to sound like a broken record – not an enviable trait when I am trying to get your attention. But President Obama has unveiled his budget request for Fiscal Year 2015, and it is my solemn duty as an advocate of all things census to make visions of smartphone-friendly questionnaires, linked government databases and shrinking dollar signs dance in your head.

The Obama Administration requested $1.211 billion dollars for the Census Bureau. That’s a tempting pot of gold for lawmakers looking to fund programs that constituents can see and touch. Research and testing for a statistical exercise five years away? Not so exciting.

Still, the Census Bureau needs every penny of its request to keep 2020 Census planning on track and to maintain a robust, comprehensive and user-friendly American Community Survey (ACS). Let’s break this down, shall we?

The FY2015 proposal is $266 million more than the current year discretionary appropriation of $945 million, a 28 percent increase. (The Census Bureau also receives roughly $30 million for two mandatory surveys.) All of the new money is for the Periodic Censuses and Programs account ($961M requested; +269M increase), which includes the 2020 Census and ongoing ACS ($689M requested; +226M increase).

The window of opportunity for 2020 Census research and testing will close in 2015, when the Census Bureau must select a design framework (a decision already a year behind schedule) and begin the second phase of census planning: operational design and systems development. In a related new initiative, the president requested a bump in funding to build an enterprise-wide integrated system for data collection and processing (Data Processing Systems — $65M requested; +34M increase). Sure would beat having unique systems for each survey and census, don’t you think? And the Census Bureau hopes to resume the Boundary and Annexation Survey, suspended this year due to budget cuts. The results come in handy when you want to put all of those enumerated people and houses in the right city, village or town.

Remember congressional angst over the ACS that led to an embarrassing 2012 House vote to eliminate the survey (with no Plan B as to how the government would function without the data)? The Census Bureau must complete a well-timed, comprehensive review of ACS content and methods next year, ahead of a national field test in 2016 and submission of topics to Congress by April 1, 2017.

The Census Bureau needs money for other programs that have been in congressional crosshairs. The 2012 Economic Census is almost history (FY2015 is the last of its six-year cycle), but as Blood, Sweat, and Tears once sang, what comes down must go up. Or something like that. Anyway, the end of one six-year quinquennial census cycle is the start of a new one; the $119 million request (+5M increase) will allow the Census Bureau to finish analyzing and disseminating 2012 Economic Census data and start planning for the 2017 canvass of American businesses.

Finally, the president is proposing $248 million for the Census Bureau’s second major account, Salaries and Expenses (S&E), a decrease of $4 million from current year funding. The ongoing activities covered under S&E include vital economic, demographic and social statistics collected through the Current Population Survey, Survey of Income and Program Participation, and other programs.

We’ll have more information about the Census Bureau’s plans for 2015 when the Commerce Department releases detailed budget justifications in a week or two. In the meantime, congressional appropriators are getting down to work. The deadline for submitting testimony to the House Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies is March 31; the Senate subcommittee deadline is April 25. Let’s see if we can make the foundation of our democracy and basis of informed decision-making sound as exciting as we know it is.