Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Census Director's Assessment of Impact of Budget Cuts

Here's is a link to the Director of the US Census Bureau's blog where he discusses the impact of recent passed cuts by the House of Representatives to the census budget and American Communities Survey.

In his words...

  • The Appropriations Bill eliminates the Economic Census, which measures the health of our economy. It terminates the American Community Survey, which produces the social and demographic information that monitors the impact of economic trends on communities throughout the country. It halts crucial development of ways to save money on the next decennial census. In the last three years the Census Bureau has reacted to budget and technological challenges by mounting aggressive operational efficiency programs to make these key statistical cornerstones of the country more cost efficient. Eliminating them halts all the progress to build 21st century statistical tools through those innovations. This bill thus devastates the nation’s statistical information about the status of the economy and the larger society.

The loss of these important data sources could be devastating to local agencies and governments as they compete for fewer and fewer federal resources.