The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician • Hacker News Board

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#101

Post by spacemanmatt » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 2:12 PM UTC

woo49 wrote: post #91

ccaleb wrote: post #85

This is only tangentially related, but I think it provides important context to this discussion about the motives of those involved. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/30/us/census-citizenship-que...

Both sides have ulterior motives. Counting illegal immigrants in the census helps Democrats because liberal states have more of them. This is just a fact. You may think we should still count as many of them in the census, that's fine. But don't pretend there is no issue with one side of the argument. Mentioning motives of one side but not the other is naive. It also prevents us from having a real conversation about t…

Oh look, a both-sides sock puppet. Right where I expect to find one, too.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#102

Post by rubyist5eva » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 2:13 PM UTC

kube-system wrote: post #73

rubyist5eva wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't strawman anything. Original question was asking about race discrimination and the response was about "poor people".

The original question asked > Is it more to do with poverty than race

Fair enough, I misinterpreted the original question because the quoted part of the article did not reference poverty. Thank you.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#103

Post by hn_throwaway_99 » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 2:13 PM UTC

woo49 wrote: post #91

ccaleb wrote: post #85

This is only tangentially related, but I think it provides important context to this discussion about the motives of those involved. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/30/us/census-citizenship-que...

Both sides have ulterior motives. Counting illegal immigrants in the census helps Democrats because liberal states have more of them. This is just a fact. You may think we should still count as many of them in the census, that's fine. But don't pretend there is no issue with one side of the argument. Mentioning motives of one side but not the other is naive. It also prevents us from having a real conversation about t…

TBH, I don't think it really matters. I mean, take voting for example. Democrats have a clear ulterior motive to expand voting, Republicans have a clear ulterior motive to make voting as difficult as possible.

But, TBH, I don't really care much about their motives, because in a democracy we should be trying to get the most eligible people as possible to vote. Republicans are trying to prevent people from voting because they believe the more voting is expanded, the harder it is to get a majority of people to vote for them. Well, tough shit.

To see what has happened in Texas, with dropboxes limited to one-per-county, I feel like the previous argument against voter fraud has kind of gone out the window, and now it's just blatant - there is no rational reason the giant county that contains Houston should be limited to the same number of dropboxes as a rural county with orders of magnitude fewer people.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#104

Post by censusthrowaway » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 2:14 PM UTC

Here is some inside info. I work for the Census. It is a highly dysfunctional organization. Nothing to do with current administration.

The various software the local offices use actively hinders the job of management and enumerators (the people who come to your door). Hundreds of and hundred of millions of dollars and incalculable time is wasted just due to this. Imagine the worst ERP or CRM that you have ever used, this is worse and approximately 250 offices use it across the country, and this inhibits the jobs of nearly half a million people.

Talk to any Area manager, Lead Census Field Manager/Field manager, Office Operation Supervisor, or Office Clerk. They will tell you how they have to fight the software to get their job done.

Truth is the Census could be done with half the people. There is plain incompetence in middle and higher management. Those making decision on software and marketing seem to have no understanding of the job those in local offices do. It is so bad local offices don't really have an accurate idea who even is still employed in the field working cases.

Why doesn't this change? Nobody wants to lose their job. Middle management wants numbers and to hit goals. It doesn't matter if the numbers are actually accurate. Often they will not be. Notes about cases (organizations we are trying to count their people/or individual housing units) pile up inside systems that nobody has time to read. It is easier to close a case then actually resolve it and accurately count people.

Not only is there no incentive to do the job correctly, it will actually get you in trouble if you do things right.

Yes this is a random throwaway account on HN. But to verify just ask nearly anyone who works for the Census. I hope to post more on this later when I have time. Feel free to ask any questions.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#105

Post by SpicyLemonZest » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 2:14 PM UTC

stdbrouw wrote: post #62

VLM wrote: post #42

I realize for political reasons we have to only support one side via extreme sophistry, essentially the whole topic is a giant dog whistle test to make sure our community is politically pure. However its VERY hard to ignore the reality that essentially 100% of the US population has no difficulty, on average, kinda paying electric bills and property tax bills and phone bills. Part of the sophistry is pretending that n…

You seem to be extremely certain of your position and seem to find it impossible to believe that Robert Santos, the statistician in question, could have any motive other than a political one in sounding the alarm. However, "if people can pay their electric bill then surely they can respond to the census" is not a fact and it's not a logical argument, it's just your gut feeling, which you seem to find a superior sourc…

I can imagine neutral, nonpolitical commentary on the census process, but that's not what Santos is offering. He says that the census wouldn't have been fair even if the count had been extended, due to factors such as "the public policy climate" and "toxic immigrant policies".

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#106

Post by plushpuffin » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 2:14 PM UTC

rubyist5eva wrote: post #95

plushpuffin wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Senate has traditionally accepted the president's nominee assuming s/he was qualified. Garland had previously been out forward by the GOP as an example of a qualified and respected judge. And let's not forget that had Clinton won, the GOP was determined to keep that seat on the court empty for 4 years. They said as much. And when they refused to even consider Garland they also said that their newly made-up rule w…

Don't act like "your side" wouldn't do the exact same if the parties were reversed.

A few years ago, they wouldn't have. Now they would, and should. The GOP has escalated and the Democrats need to respond in kind by expanding the Supreme Court and the federal judiciary, to undo the damage caused by years of Republican obstruction which prevented Obama from appointing hundreds of judges.

Please stop pretending that this game of escalating stakes and norm-breaking is somehow on the Democrats. We've been watching Mitch McConnell and we remember what he's done.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#107

Post by atoav » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 2:15 PM UTC

woo49 wrote: post #91

ccaleb wrote: post #85

This is only tangentially related, but I think it provides important context to this discussion about the motives of those involved. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/30/us/census-citizenship-que...

Both sides have ulterior motives. Counting illegal immigrants in the census helps Democrats because liberal states have more of them. This is just a fact. You may think we should still count as many of them in the census, that's fine. But don't pretend there is no issue with one side of the argument. Mentioning motives of one side but not the other is naive. It also prevents us from having a real conversation about t…

Not American but I think a census should reflect reality. This means: which people (regardless of legal status) are currently living in an given area.

How this then translates into policy is an entirely different question, but essentially misrepresenting what should be objective reality for cheap political points is asking for trouble. A bit like closing your eyes: it doesn't make things go away.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#108

Post by spacemanmatt » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 2:15 PM UTC

WillPostForFood wrote: post #84

bo1024 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are many reasons. They discuss poverty in the article. I would agree with cultural distrust of government officials. And very importantly, everything around the citizenship question/issue. > The notion of these counts ever being used for enforcement — basically targeting high population, low citizenship-count blocks for ICE raids or whatever — that would be really, really problematic. Stepping back, think in ge…

Because of the bad optics of this, the US census has traditionally been extremely independent from law enforcement. The government has recently been attacking this barrier e.g. with the citizenship question Two points on history and tradition. The census was originally carried out by the US Marshals. That should indicate the importance and weight of the project. The citizenship question was part of the census until 2…

The census is used to fairly apportion infrastructure to areas where people actually live. That this is done by representation is an artifact of our political system, not the Constitutional mandate that requires he census. It's not a fair question, as you say.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#109

Post by maxerickson » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 2:16 PM UTC

woo49 wrote: post #91

ccaleb wrote: post #85

This is only tangentially related, but I think it provides important context to this discussion about the motives of those involved. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/30/us/census-citizenship-que...

Both sides have ulterior motives. Counting illegal immigrants in the census helps Democrats because liberal states have more of them. This is just a fact. You may think we should still count as many of them in the census, that's fine. But don't pretend there is no issue with one side of the argument. Mentioning motives of one side but not the other is naive. It also prevents us from having a real conversation about t…

That's not an ulterior motive, it's a direct motive for counting everybody.

An ulterior motive would be expressing support for a counting method with a statement about the technical superiority of the method, but really preferring it because of some bias inherent in it. The "ulterior" part comes from the motivation being different than what is publicly expressed.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#110

Post by RonaldRaygun » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 2:18 PM UTC

rubyist5eva wrote: post #45

tolbish wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

thought it was sarcasm at first, but it appears rubyistSeva genuinely isn't aware that the Democratic nominee was blocked four years ago on the basis of it being an election year, only for the Republican party to turn around and do exactly that this year.

The Republican party had no reason to hold confirmation hearings for Merrick Garland - the votes did not exist to confirm him. The role of the Senate is to provide advice and consent - there was no consent so there was no reason to do it. This year is different - Republicans hold the majority of the Senate and the White House. This nominee has the votes.

Believe it or not, the Senate used to actually follow the law as written and advice and consent, and not simply reject out of hand because the nominating president was of the opposing political party. 13 Supreme Court Justices have been confirmed by a Senate controlled by the opposing party since 1945. All of these were under a Republican President and confirmed by a Democratic Senate.

The last Justice to fail to be confirmed was Bork in 1987, for the very valid reason of his association with Nixon's Saturday Night Massacre prior to the latter's forced resignation.

The process was never intended to be a political, partisan battle, and this was respected by both parties until 2016. Merrick Garland was (and remains) eminently qualified for the seat, and nobody serious on either side of the aisle claims otherwise. I defy anyone to give me a cogent reason why he should not have been given the prescribed consent by the Senate. Mitch McConnell has most likely indelibly changed the Supreme Court confirmation process to be a purely political one, to the great detriment of the Court. Incredibly shortsighted, in my opinion, as it has dispensed with all pretense of a supra-partisan deliberating body.