Transcript Slide 1

Population
Why do we study population?
•the increasing population is the
most serious issue facing the world
• in order to fully understand a
nation, region, province, city, etc.
one must have an understanding of
the characteristics of the human
population in that area
Who Studies Population?
• Demographers
What do they want to know?
• How many? Where can this information be found?
• How is population changing?
• How quickly is this population change?
• What are the characteristics and composition of this
population?
•How is the population distributed?
•What implication do these factors have for the
future?
How do they get the information?
• Censuses – a collection of data about a
population
• started in early Roman times
• Doomsday Book – England 1066 – one of
the best known modern tallies of population
• collected through enumerators that go
door-to-door (LDC’s), or deliver censuses
that are to be mailed back to the
government (Canada)
What kind of information is collected?
population
gender
religion
age
nationality
occupation
language
home ownership
education
marital status
household income
possessions
Inaccuracies with data collection:
• Homelessness
• Fear of entering slums and crime-ridden
areas
• Isolation
• Confusion
• Privacy Issues
• Reputation
• Interpretation of questions and data
Problems that result from inaccuracies:
• Unfair political representation
• Unfair levels of funding
• Lack of funding for homeless people
• Product Failure
• Faulty economic policies
• Difficulty in comparing nations
How often do we conduct a census?
• Frequency of censuses varies depending on
the nation and their resources. It is very
expensive to conduct a census and it requires
a lot of people to collect the data.
•In Canada – every 5 years
• The Canadian government employs 4000
(Stats Canada), 500 work in the census
department.
• Canada hires 50,000 people on short-term
contracts in a census year to work as
enumerators.