The plan for the 2020 census includes a large push for online responses. This is not a novel idea, it’s a very sensible one in a country where everyone should have access to high speed internet. Of course, since our communication systems have become more privatized, with little to no oversight, this is not the case. But, a big part of pushing the online census is to cut down on other costs, while making the process more efficient and—in a perfect world—less intrusive. The 2020 Census Operation Plan explains it aims to:
Maximize online response to the 2020 Census via contact strategies and improved access for respondents and collect response data via the Internet to reduce paper and Nonresponse Followup.
The operational plan has everything worked out: online census information in multiple languages, response times, training, etc. Of course, this only works if people have access to internet, and know that they will be able to stand up and be counted that way. Unfortunately, while Latinos in the United States have increased their internet use, according to Pew Research, the actual access to broadband internet has not changed much since 2010.
Overall, 59% of Hispanic adults report that they currently subscribe to internet service of any kind at home, but the demographic divides in home internet subscription rates among Hispanics are wide. For example, among Hispanic adults with less than a high school education, just one-third say they have a home internet subscription.
The Trump administration will be sending paper census surveys as well, but this has historically needed to be backed up by feet-on-the-ground surveying. The latter method has been greatly reduced for the upcoming census, in no small part due to the focus on online response. The country’s broadband adoption rates are also an important indicator of how misleading this move to online census taking is. And when you consider that even by the U.S. Census Bureau’s own estimation, Latinos are frequently undercounted, there doesn’t seem to be anything this administration or its officials are doing to even pretend they care.
Current government officials frequently point to broadband access maps as an indicator of who has broadband, as opposed to who could have broadband if they could afford it. The fact of the matter is, the maps of broadband access the FCC, under telecom shill Ajit Pai released last year are laughably inaccurate—something well covered by CityLabs. But more importantly, the United States’ broadband costs are some of the highest in the world and have led to slowdowns, across the board, in adoption. This means that just because some groups of people have an ethernet outlet in their home it doesn’t mean they can actually access that internet.
This is the basis of progressive fights to both fund and expand programs like Lifeline, that subsidize communications services for low-income homes, and regulate the runaway prices determined by a monopolistic telecom industry.
Conservatives have spoken a lot about bridging the digital divide in our country and connecting rural communities underserviced by big telecom companies, while doing everything in their power to hamper and roll back the programs put in place to make those same telecoms provide the democratic access to modern communications systems our country demands.