Turn the Census Into a Big Lottery to Benefit Charities

To the Editor:

It is disconcerting to read about the problems facing the U.S. Census Bureau, including the lack of funds to support non-profit efforts to encourage households to mail in the census forms (“Counting on Charities,” September 9). It is disconcerting because there is an approach that would get the most accurate head count ever, pick up the uncounted of the last census without sampling, reduce the cost of Census 2000 by up to $3-billion, and end the partisan bickering over the issue.

The plan, called “Census 2000: For Citizens, Charity and Country,” is a simple one. By combining the census with a national lottery to benefit charities, it attacks head on the bureau’s major problem: the failure of millions of American households to mail back their census forms.

In 1990, only 65 per cent of households mailed in their census forms, forcing the bureau to go door to door to contact about 30 million households — at an added cost of about $1-billion. Given the bureau’s estimate of only 61 per cent mail-ins for 2000 and its difficulty hiring field personnel, the additional cost could range from $1.7-billion to $3-billion.

The Census 2000 lottery could raise the mail-in percentage to 90 per cent or more, which would then permit the bureau to really concentrate its staff and dollars on the remaining 10 per cent or less. In the end, an accurate count without sampling — the result sought by both Democrats and Republicans — would occur.

Here’s how it would work. Every census form mailed in would enter its sender in the Census 2000 Lottery, which would award 435 prizes of $10,000 (one for each Congressional District, reminding Americans of the basic purpose of the Census), and 100 prizes of $50,000, designed to remind Americans that in the Senate, all states are equal. There would also be a grand prize to a single winner: $1-million.

What’s more, every prize winner would name the charity of his or her choice, which would receive an amount equal to the designator’s prize. That would not only generate millions to over 500 charitable organizations, but would focus attention on charities in general in a way that would be difficult to duplicate at any price.

Joseph Rosen
President
PSR Associates
Lincoln, Mass.