Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics - We Need The Long Form

I met my wife while attending Simon Fraser University as a "mature" student just over 30 years ago. We used to sit together in Statistics class. Since then I've done very little with this particular subject but at least you know I've taken a course in it.

Prior to that I worked for a time-sharing computer company that provided access to the Stats-Can database, and I had a chance to play with some of the data. Since then I've gone into the database for all manner of information on demographics and information. The information was completely devoid of personally identifiable information and in courses from the Stats-Can people we had it impressed upon us that as a vendor of their information we were included in their security infrastructure and personally culpable for any such personal information if it ever did get to us. This part (the security of the individual) of the gathering of statistics is of such high concern that those in Stats-Can pride themselves on not letting anyone know what is on specific forms; it's far higher than I've found in any other government department or body that I've dealt with, anywhere.

In any case, chances are that Stephen Harper has never taken a course in statistics. If he had he'd know that getting rid of the requirement to fill in the "long form" census form will deprive Canada of information that is vital to not only the government itself, but to much of the business base that feeds the government taxes.

And in my opinion, if Stephen Harper has in fact taken a statistics course then his willful undermining of this incredibly valuable resource ranks right up there with being anti-Canadian - not quite treason, but certainly culpably criminal.

The fact that they (government) have changed the complete removal of the form to a "voluntary" basis simply screws up the accuracy of the information gathered to the point where relying upon it will cost more money than relying upon the more accurate "required" filing; even if people screw up on some of the answers purposely in either case. It all comes down to how likely the information is to be accurate, a calculable reliability factor - and how business and government fund their programs to take advantage of this information. The larger the potential for unreliability, the less accurate can be programs and tactics based upon the information. That's why there is this "1% sample" long-form in the first place. It provides a statistically significant percentage of the population large enough to ensure accuracy in areas small enough to include things like a government office.

Think of it this way. If the mandatory long-form filing provided accuracy enough that a determination could be made that in a town of 5,000 people there are enough people (for example, out of work people) that it should have a particular service (government unemployment office for example) then just removing the requirement to fill this form in might lower the accuracy enough that only towns of 10,000 people can be known to have enough unemployed people to require such an office. This means that even if a town of 6,000 people had 20% as opposed to the average 7% unemployment and really needed such an office, the government would not know this for a certainty and could easily say that "policy prohibits us from putting an unemployment office in your town" - you lose!

In other words for the government, it will make the provision of services to the correct people either more expensive because they will fund too many people/facilities "just in case" to cover the uncertainty, or make the provision of the services inadequate "because we didn't know there were so many people in this position"

The government gets a larger "fudge factor" within which to wriggle around in their fiscal and budgetary shenanigans. 

And business and Industry can't pinpoint their own programs and developments as closely, so they are not as efficient as they can be.

A business park developer looking at the statistics for a particular area would not know for a certainty that there were enough people of a particular kind to support the kind of businesses he wished to attract to his about-to-be-developed shopping center. If he developed and there were not quite enough then he loses money. If he forgoes the development and there were enough then the community loses out.

The bottom line is - Canada loses on the world stage:

The government can play either side of "the percentages" on program funding/creation - and business is less efficient.

I don't care if you personally understand statistics, the bottom line is that without the information we are all the poorer.

As for this concept that you're giving up "personal" information, get over it. You give up far more personal and personally identifiable information to far more people every time you use your cable TV converter box, your internet browser or for that matter, just carrying around your cell phone. And don't get me going on how much you can lose from the information on your new "high-tech" passport or driver's license. I hope you keep them in tin-foil.

Stats-Can knows they rely upon their reputation for not disclosing personally identifiable information to ANYONE, including any other government body. If the government suddenly decided to remove that bar to access, then you would hear me and everyone else who really knows statistics howling to the moon. Until then - please support the mandatory long-form. I'll certainly fill in mine if it comes.