The Census is important, and that is something that all American should know. In the past the Census has been considered a waste of time, resources, and even an invasion of privacy. While there is merit on both sides of the argument, it always boils down to doing what’s best for the majority. The Census is not a choice, the United States Constitution mandates that ever American citizen be counted every 10 years in order to apportion a proper number of representatives for the state to send to Washington to be part of the House of Representatives. The stats derived from the questions on the forms also are used to define the scope of federal funding for social and economic programs, including federal aid, school grants, state budgets, taxes and a host of other programs.
Historically the Census was done by hand and someone would go to every household in America and count the number of people in the home. Slaves however were were counted by what was known as the Three-Fifths Compromise of 1787 which said for ever five slaves only three would be counted as individuals. And of course American Indians weren’t counted or taxed for that matter at all since they weren’t considered citizens proper.
To this day the Census bureau believes they have never accurately counted every American citizen which is one of the largest controversies associated with the Census, because if everyone is not being counted then how are the statistical allocations of funds and programs accurately being applied to any particular area or group. Well that’s literally the billion dollar question.
To learn more about the census stop by http://www.census.gov/ there is tons of info and a real-time population clock for both the US and the world. Also check out the embedded video below it has important information about the barcode label on your census form.
