CENSUS GOALS: Management Choices and Prospects for Accuracy.

The 2010 census will differ from both the 1990 and 2000 censuses in that statistical adjustment of the counted data will not be a possibility. The Census Bureau will, therefore, create a design that incorporates no features-survey or otherwise-pertinent to adjustment. This does not mean that the Census Bureau has achieved accuracy with its counts. The recent reductions of the national net undercounts to amounts near zero reflect the fact that there are approximately equal numbers of omissions and duplications and other erroneous counts. The differential undercount, traditionally measured as the difference between the black and white undercounts, is little changed since the 1940 census, and in Census 2000 it was about three percentage points. This paper reviews the problem of census design as it existed for recent censuses and continues to exist for the upcoming 2010 census. It compares the constitutional goal of providing an accurate distributive count among the states and local areas with the Census Bureau's actual goal of minimizing the net national undercount. Because statistical adjustment is no longer a possibility, the design choices focus more on management rather than on statistical issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]