Ditch the Census

This year's U.S. Census already is the most expensive in the nation's history, even adjusting for inflation. Estimates for the total price tag are about $14.5 billion. That works out to be about $46.93 for every man, woman and child in the country, based on a projected population count of 308 million.

Even those bloated billion dollar figures are suspect. The non-partisan Government Accountability Office called the cost estimates "not reliable because it lacks adequate documentation." As if that wasn't damning enough, it added that the figures were "not comprehensive, accurate or credible." In other words, the estimates are meaningless.

In its summary, the GAO said without improvements, the Census Bureau's ability to manage its operations will be "hampered" and Congress' efforts to oversee the process will be "constrained." No kidding.

For some perspective, consider that the first U.S. Census in 1790 was conducted at a total cost of $44,377 or about 1.13 cents per person. That headcount was done entirely on horseback as census takers when house-to-house. With computers and sophisticated digital resources at its disposal, today's Census Bureau could not even approach that kind of efficiency.

There are some apologists who would argue that times have changed. The population is more spread out across the country. There are millions more people to count than the 3.9 million who were tallied in the 1790 census. Even acknowledging those facts, does not account for the wide disparity in costs.

In fact, figures for the latest census in 2000 underscore the point. The cost of the national count that year was $4.5 billion or $15.99 a person. In a decade, the cost has more than tripled. By comparison, the cost of the 2000 census was less than twice the figure for the 1990 population count ($2.4 billion and $10.02 a person).

One reason, albeit not the major one, the costs have escalated is the amount of information collected. Those early census were designed to count people. Today's modern census reaches for more details, including ethnicity and home ownership. Followup questions to a select sample are even more intrusive. Is all that data really necessary?

However, the real cost driver for the rising census expense can be laid at the feet of the Obama Administration. The President and his henchmen decided to use the current Census as a political tool. Thousands of temporary workers have been added to the payrolls to dress up the unemployment numbers. Reports have circulated about workers being "hired", trained and sent home. Other news accounts suggest workers were recycled through the same training several times to enable the Census Bureau to continue to keep the individual on the payroll, even though no work was being done.

Without such chicanery, unemployment would have reached double digits by now. Democrats were determined to avoid crossing that threshold at all costs, including using the U.S. Census to game the numbers.

That's another reason that it is time to end the charade. Once the current population count is completed, Washington needs to pull the plug on the decennial U.S. Census. It makes no economic sense to continue this costly exercise.

Federal and state governments already have boat loads of information on citizens. It exists in data bases maintained by agencies from the federal Internal Revenue Service to the state Department of Motor Vehicles. Mine the available data. Estimate a population headcount and then be done with it.

Does it really matter of the count is off by say a million or so people? Some politicians have argued for years that the current method under counts some groups of people. If that's the case, then no one can argue that an estimate based on available government data could be any worse and it certainly could done at a lower cost.