Census Bureau Updates

Transcript Census Bureau Updates

Census Bureau Updates

SDC Affiliates Fall Meetings Salem, Oregon Seattle, Washington September 16 & 19, 2014

Releases / Updates

 American Community Survey  2020 Decennial Census  Data tools and apps

American Community Survey

Fall 2014 Releases

Data Product 2013 ACS 1-Year Estimates 2011-2013 ACS 3-Year Estimates 2009-2013 ACS 5-Year Estimates Planed Release Date September 18 , 2014 October 23, 2014 December 4, 2014 Population Size of Area 65,000 + 20,000 + All Geographies

The American Community Survey is the only source of local statistics for most of the 40 topics it covers - - such as education, occupation, language, ancestry and housing costs - - for even the smallest communities.

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Questionnaire Topics

American Community Survey (ACS)

Demographic

Sex Age Race Ethnicity Household Relationship Group Quarters

Social

Families Education Marital Status Fertility Grandparent Caregivers Veterans Disability Status Language at Home Citizenship Migration

Economic

Income Poverty Food Stamps / SNAP Employment Status Occupation Industry Journey to Work Place of Work Health Insurance

Housing

Tenure Occupancy Structure Housing Value Taxes / Insurance Utilities Mortgage Monthly Rent Vehicles

Items in red were also collected on the 2010 Census 8

Content Review

Information Gathering  Field Representative Survey: May 2014 • 1,063 responses from six Regional Offices and three Contact Centers (representing 96.6% response rate from 1,125 interviewers in sample) • 6 questions concerning perceived intrusiveness, burden, sensitivity for each item on the questionnaire • 3 most “problematic” ACS questions based on preliminary score and number of mentions • Income – wages • Type of Internet access • Property value

Information Gathering  Data user feedback form: June-July • Received 932 responses, representing 3,405 total mentions of high-value or frequently-used questions • Most important or most frequently used ACS questions • How did this person usually get to work last week? (457) • What is the highest degree or level of school this person has completed? (283) • What was this person's total income during the past 12 months? (247)

Information Gathering    Advisory Committee Input: May-July Working Group • Kickoff held with Census Bureau May 8 • Met to review questions for value/burden to stakeholder communities and to document example uses • Developed a report of their recommendations • Presented results to NAC Committee August 6 Findings   Perceived intrusiveness and burden considered Nearly all questions found to be of benefit to small population groups and small geographic areas

Information Gathering

 Federal agencies input: April-July • Participation from 23 agencies representing over 300 uses • Majority of agencies reporting same number or more uses over the OMB 2012 process • Commerce OGC has made a strong commitment to this project and is heavily engaged in legal reviews of all the input to provide the legal opinion on the statutory basis for cited uses

Analysis    Analytic approach is determined Methodology documentation is underway   Decision memo on business rules – 1 st (June) Draft Decision memo on selection criteria – 1 st (July) Draft  Full methodological description with appendices for each data input stream – 1 st Draft (July) To mitigate potential bias, criteria pre specified prior to review of data inputs

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Next Steps

 Develop recommendations from analysis: August  Report out findings: August - December  Federal Register notice (60 day comment period): October - December  Vet responses received through Federal Register notice: December  Make decisions that inform the OMB package: December – January  Submit OMB package: Early Spring 2015

Content Review - Milestones

Current ACS Challenges

Issue Congressional Discussion    Burden Intrusiveness Harassment Defund or Eliminate Survey  Mandatory  Penalties Voluntary Reduce or Eliminate Survey

Issue: Mandatory vs. Voluntary

 Respondent participation mandatory (current) • Most respond on their own (59% self-response rate) • Phone & field interviews boost overall response rate (97.4%)  Impact of voluntary • Testing found survey costs would increase by at least $90 million annually • Reduced quality due to (1) declines in participation and (2) number of completed interviews (rather than increase in survey errors) • Inability to release estimates for small geographies and small population subgroups

ACS Data Uses Project

What are we collecting?

 Examples of how the ACS data are used  Subjects and geographic areas  Type of data user  Data product used

Why is it important to collect?

 Based on the challenges, communicate better the importance and utility of the ACS data to: (1) the public, (2) congressional leaders, (3) local / state / federal agencies, and (4) businesses, among others  Get a better understanding of the ways ACS data are used  Information can feed into the content review process  Information may impact our data products plan  Outreach messaging can be targeted for groups with similar data needs/uses

How Will Information Be Used?

 May request testimonials to support and validate the ACS • For educational or promotional purposes • Organizations may be asked to do a video on how they use ACS data • Information requested by executives and Congress will be readily available

ACS Improvements

Survey Improvements

Sample Reallocation

 Objective: improve the reliability of the estimates for small areas (under 20,000 population) • Increased sampling rates for small tracts and governmental units • Slightly decreased sampling rates in larger tracts  Begun in January 2011 • First result: 2011-2015 ACS 5-year estimates, to be released December 2016

Survey Improvements

ACS Sample Expansion

 Sample expanded from 2.9 million to 3.54 million addresses per year  Sample increase began for o Mailout in June 2011 o CATI in July 2011 o CAPI in August 2011

Survey Improvements

Expected Results

 Five Year Coefficients of Variation (CVs) for typical tracts, by size where red > yellow > green

Tract Size Category 0 – 400 401 – 1,000 1,001 – 2,000 2,000 – 4,000 4,000 – 6,000 6,000 + Average Tract Size 291 766 1,485 2,636 4,684 8,337 CVs before reallocation and sample expansion 66% 41% 29% 26% 19% 15% CVs after reallocation, before sample expansion (2.9M) 41% 30% 29% 29% 29% 28% CVs after reallocation and sample expansion (3.54M) 35% 25% 25% 25% 25% 25% 26

Survey Improvements

Internet Response Option

 Ongoing digital transformation  61 st U.S. Census Bureau survey with Internet response option  Households in sample receive letter with login instructions to secure website   Participants have the ability to review responses Assistance available to respondents  Advantages   More convenient for respondents More cost-effective  Secure and confidential

Available beginning 2013 https://respond.census.gov/acs 28

2020 Decennial Census

Census Cost per Housing Unit (2010$)

The Context

Rising costs of 2010 Census largely driven by three factors: $200,00 $180,00 $181 $160,00 (1) Declining self-response rates requiring the hiring of a large field staff (2) Paper-based and labor intensive methods requiring a large field infrastructure (3) Substantial investments in major, national updating of the address frame just prior to the enumeration (2009) $140,00 $120,00 $100,00 $80,00 $60,00 $40,00 $20,00 $0,00 $14 1970 $29 1980 $40 1990 $70 2000 $108 2010 (estd) 2020 (proj) (Projected cost for 2020 assumes no change in design and past patterns of cost growth; also includes the costs for American Community Survey)

Goals

 The strategic outcome is to develop a design which strikes a balance between delivering the highest quality census while reducing costs and managing risks.  The 2020 Census has four strategic goals: • An accurate and complete census • Embraced and valued results • An efficient census • A well-managed census

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2014 Census Test

Where/When Is Test Being Conducted?

 Approximately 190,000 housing units • Part of Montgomery County, MD • Part of Washington, DC  Temporary field office in Silver Spring, MD  End of June through September • “Census Day” (reference date) was July 1, 2014

2014 Census Test

Overall Goals

 Making decennial headcount quick, easy, and safe for all to participate  Provide substantial taxpayer savings while maintaining commitment to high quality and accuracy • Smart use of technology • Use of existing government data sources (administrative records)

2014 Census Test

Why These Locations?

 Sites meet criteria for highly developed (urban) areas near less developed areas  Size of sites provides efficient and cost effective ways to test workloads  Sites’ proximity to Census Bureau Headquarters in Suitland, MD allows for easy, cost-effective observation

2014 Census Test

Why These Locations?

 Subset* of non-responding households in these two test sites will receive in-person visits to test alternative field data collection procedures  *In areas chosen based on demographic factors that include the following . . .

2014 Census Test

Why These Locations?

    Vacancy rates Household size 2010 Census response rates Mix of residences owned or rented, and single- or multi-unit    Age of householders in area Householder race and ethnicity Availability of administrative records

2014 Census Test

What is the Census Bureau Testing?

 Strategies to encourage householders to respond via mail, Internet, and other options (“self-response”)  Strategies to target in-person interviews to more efficiently follow-up with households that do not self respond (“nonresponse follow up” or “NRFU”)

2014 Census Test

What Is the Scope of the Test?

   Internet self-response mode and contact strategies for Internet preregistration   E-mail and automated voice invitations Mobile devices used by field staff to enumerate non-responding households Alternative NRFU contact strategies Use of administrative records to identify cases to remove from nonresponse workload  Use of adaptive design methodologies to manage field enumerator work assignments

2014 Census Test

What’s on the Questionnaire?

 Wording changes from 2010 Census • Testing changes on race and Hispanic origin questions, combining race and ethnicity into one question • Testing new response categories for opposite sex and same-sex husband/wife/spouse and unmarried partner relationships, both on the Internet and on paper data collection questionnaires

2014 Census Test

Will There Be Other Tests?

 Additional testing activities planned for 2015 and subsequent years • Plans still under development • Will likely be conducted in different geographic areas across the United States

2014 Census Test

Important Terms

 Self-response • Where households complete and return their census questionnaire in a timely manner (includes Internet response) – require no in person follow-up visit  Administrative records • Collected by government agencies to run or administer a program (IRS, for example)

2014 Census Test

Will Results Be Released?

 Test is designed to measure how well a variety of new technologies and census taking methods work • Not designed to obtain a complete and accurate count • Official population counts will not be released  Test will support the critical research on potential methods for the 2020 Census

Data Tools and Apps

Homepage: census.gov

Developers & Mobile Apps

Data Tab

Developers Page

Mobile Apps

Economic Indicators

Mobile Apps

Dwellr

Mobile Apps

Pop Quiz (of States)

Census Homepage: census.gov

QuickFacts

QuickFacts Population threshold

: 5,000

Geographies

: State, county, place

Topics

: Current demographic, business, & geography facts, and links to historic data (through “Browse data sets”)

census.gov > Data Tab > Data Tools and Apps Census Explorer

Four Editions

Census Explorer

Census Explorer (thematic maps) Sources:

2012 American Community Survey 5-year estimates, 2011 County Business Patterns, Census 2000, & 1990 Census

Geographies:

U.S., state, county, census tract

Topics:

Variety of demographic (currently 11) and economic (currently 6) variables

census.gov > Data Tab > Data Tools and Apps

Easy Stats

Easy Stats Geographies:

State, county, place

Topics:

Financial, jobs, housing, people, education -- all variables are crossed with race and ethnicity

Easy Stats

American FactFinder (AFF): factfinder2.census.gov

Census Homepage: census.gov

factfinder2.census.gov

American FactFinder (AFF)

Help

American FactFinder

Assistance with AFF

• Click Help

(AFF mainpage, top right)

• Online User Guide • Virtual Tour • Community Facts • Guided Search • Advanced Search • Download Options • Using Data • Tables • Maps • Narrative Profiles • Tutorials • Glossary

Community Facts

American FactFinder

(AFF) Community Facts tab

factfinder2.census.gov

American FactFinder (AFF)

Community Facts tab

AFF Community Facts

Each of the 10 filter bars presents a single variable for the selected geography, as well as links to additional tables for the same topic and the same geographic area

factfinder2.census.gov

American FactFinder (AFF)

Guided Search tab

Recommended for Novice Data Users

AFF Guided Search

User answers prompts, then clicks “Next” or a numbered arrow to proceed -- arrows 1 through 4 may be selected in any order

factfinder2.census.gov

American FactFinder (AFF)

Advanced Search tab

AFF Advanced Search

Filter bars facilitate searches. Object is to select filters, such as Topics, to refine search. All filters will appear in the Your Selections box to be applied to the final table selection.

Topics Filter Bar

“People” Menu Expanded

Product Type = Table Format

See page 8 of the Quick Reference Guide for full descriptions of product types

Census Programs on AFF

Alphabetical listing of all programs loaded on American FactFinder

Datasets on AFF

Latest release is at the top of the list

Key Word Search

census.gov Footer

Census & ACS Questionnaires

census.gov Footer > About Us > History

Census Questionnaires

Census Questionnaires Archive

census.gov Footer > People & Households > ACS

ACS Questionnaires

Workshop Information and Data Questions Linda Clark Data Dissemination Specialist Pacific Northwest & Alaska U.S. Census Bureau Los Angeles Region [email protected]

Mobile: 206-446-8794 Los Angeles Regional Office 818-267-1725 or 888-806-6389 (toll-free ) 78