Census Day Coming Up
Prince George, B.C. – If you didn’t receive a census package in the mail today, you will by the end of this week.
Census Day is May 10th and this time around the Liberal government is expecting all Canadians to participate (This after the previous Conservative government cancelled the long form census back in 2010).
Geoff Bowlby of Statistics Canada says 75% of Canadians will fill out the short form questionnaire consisting of just 10 questions.
He says the remaining 25% of respondents will be required to fill out the long form.
“There’s 30 or 40 additional questions depending upon how you respond to those questions on topics such as education, where you work, the condition of your housing.”
And for those who don’t have access to the internet or would prefer to fill out the questionnaire by hand?
“There’s also a phone number there (on the mail out), a toll-free number where you can request that paper questionnaire.”
Those who don’t fill it out on time can expect to hear from the government.
“We want it done as quickly as possible of course but we’re not expecting everyone to have responded by the 10th,” says Bowlby.
“After the 10th, if we haven’t heard from you what we’ll do is send you a friendly reminder. A couple of weeks after that, if we still haven’t heard from you then we may start knocking on the door or making a phone call reminding you of how important it is to respond.”
Just how important?
“The information is absolutely essential. It forms the backbone of what the federal, provincial and municipal governments use as their information sources.”
He says that includes essential information that allows governments to make decisions on core services like school, fire and police location.
Federally, Bowlby says the population information drawn from the 2011 census prompted the government to increase (by 30) the number of seats in the House of Commons.
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“Just how important? “The information is absolutely essential. It forms the backbone of what the federal, provincial and municipal governments use as their information sources.”
“He says that includes essential information that allows governments to make decisions on core services like school, fire and police location.”
Meh, unless you are a Conservative, then who cares about gathering evidence and making evidence based decisions on how to spend valuable taxpayer money. Just spend it on ideology, hunches, and whimsy. No need to measure anything, or measurably increase or reduce anything… just take thier word for it that progress is being made… LOL… it is the Conservative way, goodbye and good riddance!!!
Welcome back long form consensus, and evidence based decision making!!!
You never fail for the best chuckle of the day.
“Just spend it on ideology, hunches, and whimsy.”
Sounds a lot like every governing party ever since confederation, including T2 and his Liberal Party.
“Federally, Bowlby says the population information drawn from the 2011 census prompted the government to increase (by 30) the number of seats in the House of Commons”
But I thought the mandatory long form census was dropped in 2010 and there was no relevant information after that? Maybe we are being spoon fed once again.
The increase in seats is based on sheer numbers in the population, which is the most basic function of a census, not detailed demographic information drawn from the long-form.
… Make decisions on core services like school … Christy and company have already made their decisions for schools – NO.
There are many seniors that don’t have or even understand a computer- so sending out this access code is just a waste of time in many cases. And so, the paper questionnaire really makes more sense. I can see this form with the access code getting thrown away so easily!
I just filled mine out. What an utter waste of time! So typical of anything to do with this Liberal government. They already have all the information they’re asking for that’s likely to be in any ways important. Is it vital to know how I get to work, and that I’m the sole occupant of my vehicle when I go? It’s easy to see why the Conservatives relieved us of the inanity of having to answer stupid questions like this, and numerous others. Just another ‘make work’ project to reward the friends of the Liberal Party..
Once the government in power sets some direction on the quality/quantity of census data they would like to see collected, Stats Canada/Census Canada decide what is needed to accomplish the intent of the government.
While it is true that some information will already be in government hands, especially when one includes all levels of government and government agencies, that information is not all shareable due to privacy laws.
There is another key component to the Census data and that is that it is a slice in time.
While the USA does their census every 10 years, the amount of information Canada collects compared to the USA is a pittance.
Will be interesting to see what the online response rate is … will give us real time insight on 2016 and the use of the Internet …
You may not have received the census notice yet, or else not read it.
Computers are not needed. If you would rather fill out a paper form, it will be sent to you. They have set up a phone number to call, which is an automated response that requires the access code to activate a paper form to be sent to the location associated with the access code.
If one still has questions, there is another number to call.
Finally, there is a phone number fro those who are deaf and need access to TTY.
What is missing is that there is not a braille version of the notice.
Justin can just take a guess about my information.
I remember the time the City used to encourage people to fill out the census since there are several programs providing funds to the City are based on population stats.
Colin used to lobby that the Census is inaccurate in that there is an undercount of the population in Prince George. I guess he felt that Prince George is somehow special. I doubt that the attitude displayed by some is unique to Prince George.
I would not be surprised that as Trumpism spreads uncontrolled, the population of Canada will actually drop as far as statisticians go. ;-)
“Canadians Are So Excited About the Long-Form Census That They Crashed the Government Website.” I think they are just extremely happy to have Canada, and evidence and fact based decision making, back!
www .buzzfeed.com/craigsilverman/census-so-lit
I thought they might ask some ‘important’ questions on it. Like whether my pension income is enough for me to retire on without having to draw down my savings to the point of extinction long before I kick off.
Or why I feel I should continue to work past retirement age, even the one the Conservatives, (foolishly, in my opinion), extended it to just to keep up with the kind of inflation, including ever rising property taxes, that’s about to be unleashed on us, once again, under the guise of ‘prosperity’.
But no, there was nothing like that on it. It was just a bunch of stupid questions, like what sex my kids are, (which should be obvious by their names), (and if it wasn’t, there’s no place to list them as transgendered); whether my wife and I are legally married, or just shacked up together common law; how long it takes me to get to work in the morning; what time do I leave for work, etc. etc., etc. I’m aware of how statisticians can use data collected to arrive at certain results, but it seems to me that any ‘results’ derived from this kind of data only indicates a government that’s just going to feed us the same old, same old, over and over again. Not really DO anything that’ll be of much betterment to any of us.
Hmmm …. just completed the long form before reading the posts on here. I actually found the questions on how we travel to work to be quite timely in that major chunks of the federal infrastructure dollars are going to support public transit and major upgrades to transportation networks. Might not be a priority to the 72K residents of PG but probably a concern to the 2.46 Million (2012) residents in the metro Vancouver region. I know, I am an optimist, but I prefer that to reliving past election results every day.
So it looks like your kids do not have dual gender names – Hayden, Sage, Jamie, Alexis, Rory, Morgan, Pat etc.
The level of gender neutrality for given names fluctuates with the time.
Remember, you are not the only one being asked the question.
Perhaps they need to get better information and send out unique questionnaires the next time based on the various biases the respondents have so as to piss fewer of them off to get improved responses.
Ah yes, political correctness seems to raise its ugly head once more.
The thing I did not like about the on-line census form is that one is not told at the start which version is being filled out and that unless one does the agricultural census, one cannot print the completed form.
When given a paper form, one can make a photocopy. Equal treatment is not provided.
It takes a long time to make screen dumps for a long form.
With our 21st century postal service, it seems to me that anyone requesting a paper form need only phone the Census people, have a form mailed, wait for the postman, fill out the census, mail it back and that’s that.
Hmmmm. Wonder if they can get that done by May 10th.
It does not matter. The questions deal with May 10 and some specific time periods. Whether the form is filled out before or after does not matter.
In fact, if you fill out the form before, your brother and his wife’s surprise visit and overnight stay at your house will not be recorded
Of course, anyone who fills out the form now for May 10 and happens to die between now and then will have to pay a heavy penalty when Census Canada finds out. :-)
The question becomes what the reliability of the data is. I expect that it is better than a typical poll, but not perfect because of a variety of reasons such as those who think they can throw a wrench in the works.
From Census Canada:
“Data collection for this reference period: 2016-02-01 to 2016-07-29”
“The census reference date is May 10, 2016.”
“Statistics Canada will also obtain income information from personal income tax and benefits records”
“Data release – Scheduled for February 8, 2017 (Population and dwelling counts)”
I’m just going to make everything up like I did the last time I received the long form.
I laugh when people argue that it’s important we fill them out so that government resources are allocated properly. Unless you live in Quebec or Southern Ontario or to a certain extent, Vancouver you are a second class citizen who does not matter to the government.
I suspect you BS your way through everything else in your life as well.
What was your first hint?
Signing the form as axman will give you away immediately.
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