The American Community Survey (a rolling survey) is going to replace the decennial 10-year long-form census. You'll still get the short form, which is the population count one as specified in the Constitution, every 10 years.
For specifics on the legal background and justification for each question, go to: http://www.census.gov/acs/www/SBasics/SQuest/fact.htm
The reason this data is helpful is because a good 85 percent (according to the Brookings Institution) of federal grants to state and local governments, for things like Section 8 housing and job training, is allocated based on population. The census count is inaccurate by the time its data is released (generally a year or more after it's taken.) That means that fast-growing parts of the country, including, say, Will County, often don't get the money they need. ACS data is also used for transportation planning - the questions regarding where you work, when you leave, how far you go and how you get there - that can be used to determine where/ when/ if a state or city should spend money to widen roads, expand public transportation, or work harder at promoting it to get more cars off the road.
Tangentially, cities in Illinois get a portion of state income tax money, based on their population. Most of a city's budget is spent on wages (as with most businesses) especially public safety. If it's being paid for with income tax money, it's not being paid for with property tax money (which is just as well, as most of that is used to pay for schools anyway.) Therefore, most cities are very interested in making sure that they get their fair share of the state income tax pie, and that means using the most up-to-date data they have available, often to the point where cities contract with the Census Bureau to perform a "special census" of their area for this reason.
Personally, I've been poking around the data sets to try to figure out how to write about professions where annual raises do not match cost-of-living increases, in other words, jobs where the longer you work at them, the worse off economically you are. And you wondered why I need to learn Excel better....
Finally, without ACS data, we would not be able to have comparisons like this, apocryphal or not: Fewer American households have TiVo than outhouses.
But I agree with Amy. You think it's unconstitutional and invasive, don't answer those questions - or the whole thing. You'll be moving in a couple months anyway; it'll take them 10 years to find you and pester you with another one.
no subject
For specifics on the legal background and justification for each question, go to: http://www.census.gov/acs/www/SBasics/SQuest/fact.htm
The reason this data is helpful is because a good 85 percent (according to the Brookings Institution) of federal grants to state and local governments, for things like Section 8 housing and job training, is allocated based on population. The census count is inaccurate by the time its data is released (generally a year or more after it's taken.) That means that fast-growing parts of the country, including, say, Will County, often don't get the money they need.
ACS data is also used for transportation planning - the questions regarding where you work, when you leave, how far you go and how you get there - that can be used to determine where/ when/ if a state or city should spend money to widen roads, expand public transportation, or work harder at promoting it to get more cars off the road.
Tangentially, cities in Illinois get a portion of state income tax money, based on their population. Most of a city's budget is spent on wages (as with most businesses) especially public safety. If it's being paid for with income tax money, it's not being paid for with property tax money (which is just as well, as most of that is used to pay for schools anyway.) Therefore, most cities are very interested in making sure that they get their fair share of the state income tax pie, and that means using the most up-to-date data they have available, often to the point where cities contract with the Census Bureau to perform a "special census" of their area for this reason.
Personally, I've been poking around the data sets to try to figure out how to write about professions where annual raises do not match cost-of-living increases, in other words, jobs where the longer you work at them, the worse off economically you are. And you wondered why I need to learn Excel better....
Finally, without ACS data, we would not be able to have comparisons like this, apocryphal or not: Fewer American households have TiVo than outhouses.
But I agree with Amy. You think it's unconstitutional and invasive, don't answer those questions - or the whole thing. You'll be moving in a couple months anyway; it'll take them 10 years to find you and pester you with another one.