AUSTRALIA BY NUMBERS: Today, the Australian Bureau of Statistics will release the first batch of its 2011 census data. We’ve asked some of the country’s top demographers and statisticians to crunch the numbers on Australia’s population: how we live, where we work, who our families are and how we spend our time.
Before we get into the numbers, though, here’s privacy expert Bruce Arnold on why some choose to opt out of the census all together.
The national census of population and housing is one of the more benign aspects of Australian government. The information collected ensures public money is allocated on the basis of need and that parliamentary House of Representatives seats are accurately distributed.
Census information is tightly protected by privacy law. And the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), responsible for the census and other data collection, has been notably free of scandals or claims of inefficiency. Why, then, do some people hate and even fear the census? Does it reflect a legitimate concern about privacy?
Australians like sharing. They share information on Facebook. They gawk at reality television shows and the tabloids. They talk loudly on mobile phones in buses, trains and taxis. They volunteer information for genealogical databases and services that are building global genetic profiles. But some of the same people – there’s little authoritative research on demographics and numbers – are vehemently opposed to ABS data collection.
Some fear the census is Big Brother’s little helper, adopting a privacy rhetoric fashionable in the United States: one that sees government as unnecessarily intrusive, or even oppressive. Complaints about the census include claims the government uses the data to profile and even track people.
Australians, along with their overseas peers, have recourse to online “survivalist” fora and magazines. Those fora attract people with anxieties about aliens (of the domestic or extraterrestrial variety), stealth helicopters and drones used by the One World Government (a conspiracy involving Prince Philip, the Vatican Bank, and the Rothschilds, among others), multinational corporations, “chemtrails” and other supposed dangers.
Unsurprisingly, these sources feature claims that the census is a precursor to identifying, disarming and incarcerating their readers. Such claims, on occasion, reference the supposed use of census data by Nazi Germany as the basis for the Holocaust, which, of course, historians regard as contentious.
Some people simply resent compliance requirements: you are legally obliged to provide census data, in contrast to the pseudo-voluntarism involved in giving your data to credit card services, banks, retailers and other non-government bodies.
It’s unclear whether the same people are unhappy about compliance with law on seat-belts, the electoral roll, taxation, speed limits, workplace safety and product safety. Australians are sometimes inconsistent in their embrace of a rigorous libertarianism and willingness to enjoy the benefits of someone else’s compliance.
Others damn ABS data collection as irrelevant, reflecting a misunderstanding of social statistics and of how information is used by the public and private sectors. If you believe that everyone else is supplying “junk data” or that politicians and bureaucrats make decisions without any reference to data, why interrupt your viewing of MasterChef for five minutes to fill out a form?
Some people appear to be comfortable with data collection – in the abstract – but are worried about the 43,000 individual collectors. What sort of person would take a casual job as a collector and face grumpy householders, barking dogs and other inconveniences? Surely only the sort of person with a prurient interest in your affairs and a desire to snicker over your secrets with a group of friends at the local Leagues Club? That discomfort is a function of vanity.
The sad reality is that information about an individual household, or about you, is just not that interesting. If you’re worried about collectors peeking and prying, you can provide information online and cut out the collector. You can more reasonably worry about your local postie having a surreptitious read of your mail or deprive you of an interesting-looking parcel.
In considering anxieties about the census, it’s worth recalling that some people would like us to provide more information, rather than less, and have that information personally identifiable and available in perpetuity.
The ABS and National Archives of Australia face ongoing pressure from genealogists to permanently preserve all census records and allow anyone access to those records. Both organisations, given respect for privacy, have resisted those calls. There are times when you can overshare information.
Do you have privacy concerns about the census? Tell us why in the comments section below.
Dale Bloom
Analyst
I am highly suspicious of any social science survey. The conclusions are often ideological, and determined before the survey has even started, and the questions can also be arranged and worded to get a required answer.
Various researchers can subjectively use certain pieces of data from the survey, and ignore other pieces of data so as to give biased and subjective conclusions.
I would think the census or any social science survey should not be compulsory.
Will Hardy
logged in via Twitter
"Various researchers can subjectively use certain pieces of data from the survey, and ignore other pieces of data so as to give biased and subjective conclusions."
But they don't. That would be very poor scientific method. All good social science researchers will identify and acknowledge possible bias and subjectivity in the data and adjust their conclusions or external relevance as appropriate. In fact, they know far, far more about bias than you.
You might be thinking of opinion polls, newspaper polls or corporate lobby "research", which have nothing to do with science.
Dale Bloom
Analyst
So what makes a “good” social science researcher? Would they have to be libertarian, utilitarian, humanist, feminist etc.
I have never yet come across a social science researcher that was not biased to the core in some way.
There is also minimal connection between good governance, social science and the census. I live in a state that will shortly have a $90 billion debt, and that debt climbed dramatically after the 2006 census.
Alexandra Kent
Doctor
That also sounds like great science!.....there was a census in 2006, there is now a large debt. As such there must be a causal relationship between the two? Surely Dale this ignores the multitude of factors that influence our economy. Not only this, it assumes that any debt is evil and harks back to the argument that we must do anything to preserve a surplus, even if it cuts all services and prevents investment in infrastructure and our future.
You are right, not all social science is good quality. But with good scientific method, it can be. And the social sciences do not have a monopoly on biased, poor quality research - it has the potential to exist in all fields without adequate scrutiny.
Regan Forrest
logged in via Twitter
Your position here appears highly inconsistent with comments you've made elsewhere on this forum Dale.
You have previously observed (with some justification) that voluntary survey sampling suffers from inherent biases with respect to who responds and who doesn't respond. Some voices are not heard in the process, thus potentially weakening the data set. This would suggest you'd be in favour of surveys that cover the entire population. Isn't the census just that?
Secondly, you have also commented favourably on HILDA survey data, saying it's one of the few studies you trust - presumably because it does cover a wider data set. What are the features that the HILDA survey has that the Census doesn't? I'm curious as to why you are apparently in favour of one but not the other.
Dale Bloom
Analyst
The excuse from various governments is that the census helps them to adequately govern. The 2006 census obviously did not help the previous QLD government to adequately govern, and in future years, QLD will have an estimated interest repayment of over $680,000 per hour.
Many people in QLD are now scratching their heads and wondering “Where did all the money go” and also, “How am I better off”
The census is a very blunt instrument in enabling effective government, and when there is so much subjectivity, bias and now feminism in social science, someone could equally rely on astrology charts for decision making.
Dale Bloom
Analyst
Regan Forrect
The HILDA survey is longitudinal, and not compulsory, and someone can withdraw from the survey if they sense bias.
The HIDA survey gathers data. Everone should still be very circumspect in how social science researchers interpret that data.
Regan Forrest
logged in via Twitter
The Census is also longitudinal - every five years isn't it? And again, it is just data. The meaning of those data is open to debate, as are any data.
I actually wasn't a participant in last year's Census because I happened to be overseas at the time, so I'm not personally familiar with the questions asked. However, the last Census I filled out comprised very basic, factual questions that could not really be interpreted as biased in any way. Perhaps I'm naive but I see no sinister plot in asking how many bedrooms are in my house or whether I own a car or not. Also, there were certain questions you could decline to answer if you so chose (questions about religious affiliation for example).
I'm aware of the phenomenon of "push-polling" and have rebutted it vigorously when I've come across it ("Surveys" conducted by MPs are notorious for this). But I would have thought the ABS is an honest broker in all this. Do you have reason to suspect otherwise?
Dale Bloom
Analyst
Regan Forrest
The HILDA survey is longitudinal, non-compulsory, and carried out in waves, with seemingly a high retention rate. This indicates most people are comfortable with it.
http://www.melbourneinstitute.com/hilda/news/news-2012.html
The HILDA survey asks many more questions than the census, but if the HILDA survey was compulsory, it would be immediately open to corruption, and less people would be comfortable with it.
Here is a typical piece of data from the 2011 census.
“Over…
Read moreRegan Forrest
logged in via Twitter
"It is data, but now waiting for social science researchers to interpret that data as being good or bad. That will depend on their subjective bias."
Anyone interpreting that data - you, me, the neighbour's cat - will bring a subjective bias to it, not just social scientists. I'm sure opinion columnists will give it a red hot go as well.
We all have lenses through which we view the world, and they will shape what we see. Just as an example, I can't escape the fact that I'm white, female, live in a Westernised country and am a native Anglophone. I have to acknowledge that those features of me, among many others, will affect what I notice about a data set and how I interpret it. To assume those things are irrelevant to the way I see the world is naive at best, insidious at worst.
The worst form of subjective bias is to assume we have none.
Dale Bloom
Analyst
Regan Forrest
There would be more reliability and democracy with the HILDA survey, where people can opt out if they sense bias, than with the census, which is compulsory and can be manipulated to achieve a desired result.
That manipulation can be carried out by government, or by social science researchers.
In fact, I tend to trust governments more than social science reaserchers, because the public can vote governments out.
So, in all, surveys such as the non-compulsory HILDA survey would be better than compulsory surveys such as the census.
Regan Forrest
logged in via Twitter
I have no reason to doubt the integrity of the HILDA survey. But there remains the theoretical possibility that there is some systematic bias in the sampling method that may (repeat MAY) influence the validity of the sample. Just to pluck an example out of thin air - people with poor English skills or poor communication skills generally. But I don't want to get into a HILDA versus Census debate as I feel that's like comparing the respective merits of the proverbial fruits. I just have an intellectual…
Read moreDale Bloom
Analyst
Regan Forrest
The check and balance with the HILDA survey is that people can withdraw out of the survey, and a retention figure is given. Perhaps there should also be a list of reasons why people have left the survey, but I haven’t found that yet.
There could also be education of the public into how surveys can be manipulated, and then the general public and the HILDA survey respondents can check to see if biased manipulation of the HILDA survey and other government run surveys is occurring.
Nick Parr
Associate Professor in Demography at Macquarie University
Dale,
You seem to have missed the point that the primary aim of the census is to provide a basis for the estimation of the total population. In this respect it is unlike any other survey. That is why measures to maximize the response to the census are essential.
Dale Bloom
Analyst
Nick, the census does more than ask questions about population.
Here were the 2006 questions, and the 2011 questions were similar
“Your name and address
Age and Sex
About the family
People on the move
Your heritage
Language
Religion
Need for assistance in everyday activities
Participation in education
Children ever born
Income
Jobs and work
Where you work and how you travel to work
Unpaid work
Persons temporarily absent
Houses, homes and dwellings
Internet access
Time capsule”
http://www.abs.gov.au/websitedbs/d3310114.nsf/51c9a3d36edfd0dfca256acb00118404/d5d15c5a41a2a1ffca25715e0023e6bb!OpenDocument
Data is meaningless numbers. The interpretation of the data becomes most important, and that is when the bias and subjectivity of social scientists and others can enter into it.
Gil Hardwick
Anthropologist
Ah, you live in Queensland, Dale. We'll get there . . . .
Yes, I agree with people's concerns with the social sciences. I have the same trouble with a lot of them, not all but a lot . . . far too many by a long chalk.
It's something we do need to sort out professionally. I disagree with the excuse that it is a 'young science' when plainly so many take it up as undergraduate study thinking they are going to get a cheap degree, or worse an ideologically correct degree, and from there make their way into the bureaucracy or onto the Labor back benches without bothering to establishing a minimal standing among their own colleagues by at least competing their Honours year.
But that's all a tad off-topic. The Commonwealth census itself is enormously valuable.
Andrew McNicol
PhD candidate (Media) at University of New South Wales
"...and the questions can also be arranged and worded to get a required answer."
Actually, all the questions are worded to get a required answer. You can apply to the ABS to have a particular question added (you need a justified reason) and the questions are occasionally revised (the past two census' were identical, however). The point is to know beforehand what sort of information you want and structure the questions and answer options in a way that gives you the most accurate data.
But I don't believe this makes the census less useful. It may be difficult to retroactively ask a new question of old census data, but at least there are specific questions in mind to begin with - otherwise many questions may end up being useless.
Nick Clark
Teacher
I think the Census is great and should be compulsory, if it wasn't people wouldn't fill it out and we wouldn't have resources like this: http://spotlight.abs.gov.au/ Lots of fun and gives a sense of what it means to be part of something larger.
Pera Lozac
Heat management assistant
Regardless of pros and cons that census can provide or not-provide- what I am extremely uncomfortable with is the Australian democratic oxymoron - we are a freedom-loving nation that lives in democracy and promotes freedom or choice but we have compulsory voting and census. It is almost like saying " you are free but you have to fit within these 4 walls". Hmmm ....makes me think about freedom and its true meaning.
Alex Peters
Investment Manager
Are you wondering how 2 people gave you a negative rating for your comment? Me too.
Is Dale Bloom wondering how 23 people gave him a negative rating for his comment? Me too.
I don’t think I’ll be lasting too long here. I’m rethinking who this place actually appeals to.
Sigh. Remember, young men of generations ago didn’t go to war and die so that you and I could have the freedom to choose_not_to vote, or_not_to complete a census if we didn't want to.
According to 2 + 23 some of the people on this web site, these men died so that THEY can come here and tell you and I we are OBLIGED to complete a census, especially when we don’t want to.
Silly us.
Alex Peters
Investment Manager
This was a real let down of an article and poor journalism. Here are the inferences I deduced from the hyperbolic rantfest.
Read more1. Because some people are comfortable share their entire life to the world via Facebook, it is illogical that anyone would still want their privacy.
2. The ABS is robust and independent. They wouldn’t improperly use or allow your information to be used. Nor will they in the future.
3. Slur come easy. Bruce, why did you need to destroy your entire position by introducing…
Chris O'Neill
Telecommunications Engineer
"the hyperbolic rantfest"
He obviously knows about those.
Alex Peters
Investment Manager
I sure do Chris. I learned from the masters, some even given oxygen here under the banner of intellectual discussion.
I also learned how to identify “smarmy” from some of the posters here too. I tell you what, why don’t you engage the comments I made? Or is that a bridge too far?
Andrew McNicol
PhD candidate (Media) at University of New South Wales
"The questions were borderline pointless. You even say 'The sad reality is that information about an individual household, or about you, is just not that interesting.'"
My reading of Arnold's point is that anyone's individual census data is not actually that interesting to anyone who may (in some very unlikely circumstance) happen across your form. They don't know you, so why would they care about your declared address or income? It's suggested this is not as much of a privacy concern as some may make it out to be.
However, the point of the census is to get statistics about the whole population. _That_ is what's interesting - and very valuable to the nation.
Troy Barry
Postgraduate student
I know some people who are uneasy with the national census and some who don't comply, and their concerns are not treated seriously in this article. Some feel that their personal "private" information is their own, like an item of personal property, and this is why they resent its "compulsory acquisition" by anyone, even such a benign institution as the ABS. Others do have a generally antipathetical relationship with "The Government" in general, maybe because of their politics or experience with the courts or the tax office or the police. That doesn't make them believers in reptilian conspiracies, merely citizens whose experiences have taught then to be wary of government agencies.
Byron Smith
PhD candidate in Christian Ethics at University of Edinburgh
Now I have a healthy suspicion of all accretions of power (government, corporate or otherwise), but I'm very willing to differentiate between various uses and abuses of power. Treating all government functions as equally suspicious simply because they are "the government" would logically lead a person to avoid using all roads, public transport, public schools, police, all services based on knowledge developed at universities with government funding (e.g. the internet, nearly all modern medical treatment) and so on.
The census is one of the more benign functions of political authority.
Troy Barry
Postgraduate student
Sure, but amongst 21.5 million Australians there's a few who are not as well-informed, logical and thoughtful as you. That doesn't make them conspiracy theorists or wilderness survivalists or any other brand of nutcase though.
Byron Smith
PhD candidate in Christian Ethics at University of Edinburgh
Sure, but the article explicitly doesn't claim that all those who resent or are suspicious of the census are nutcases.
"Some fear the census is Big Brother’s little helper, adopting a privacy rhetoric fashionable in the United States: one that sees government as unnecessarily intrusive, or even oppressive. [...] Some people simply resent compliance requirements [...] Others damn ABS data collection as irrelevant [...] Some people [...] are worried about the 43,000 individual collectors"
The…
Read moreTroy Barry
Postgraduate student
I don't say the article is factually wrong, but it tars noncompliers with the loopy brush. As I said, it fails to treat seriously the concerns of some generally reasonable people. To overlook them (as it overlooks the illiterate and those not mentally equipped to sit down for half an hour and fill out a form) is not so bad, but to belittle them by associating them with chemtrail conspiracy theories (have you ever met an Australian espousing chemtrail conspiracy theories?) is.
Rob Crowther
Architectural Draftsman
What about if one sees the general level of government uses and abuses are such to result in non-compliance. That would mean a good government department is only just worth ignoring and a bad government department is well worth ignoring.
I think your logic is questionable because you have taken the middle as the average. What if the average is well down the end of the scale?
Also, having paid for roads, police etc, why would one not be expected to use it? I think your logic falls again. I think that is akin to the 'if you belive in climate change then go and live in a cave' line.
Byron Smith
PhD candidate in Christian Ethics at University of Edinburgh
"have you ever met an Australian espousing chemtrail conspiracy theories?)"
Yes.
Guido Tresoldi
logged in via Twitter
"What sort of person would take a casual job as a collector and face grumpy householders, barking dogs and other inconveniences?"
Having been a census collector twice I can say the first time as a Uni Student it was the money. And the second time I was underemployed and I really wanted to buy a television.
Margo Saunders
Public Health Policy Researcher
The people I know who hate the Census, and who complete the form only under extreme protest, do not trust government agencies. They believe that the information that they provide to one agency will be shared with others (and are quick to provide examples of where they believe this has happened). There is definitely a significant 'big brother' view about malevolent government, and a lot of it (and I know I'm risking a dangerous generalisation here, but this is my experience) sits with the mutually-reinforcing environment of blue-collar males.
Byron Smith
PhD candidate in Christian Ethics at University of Edinburgh
If these people could show in court that such sharing between agencies has happened, they would likely be eligible for compensation.
"By law, organisations such as the Australian Tax Office, Centrelink and credit reference groups cannot have access to personal details from the Census."
http://www.abs.gov.au/websitedbs/censushome.nsf/home/privacy?opendocument&navpos=130
Rob Crowther
Architectural Draftsman
You have summed me up well.
Distrust is the primary motivator.
Beau Fahnle
Ranger
Can someone tell me why they need your name for the census? If its supposed to be so the collector can great you personally then why dosnt the online version let you submit it without giving a name?
Just something I've always wondered about...
Nick Parr
Associate Professor in Demography at Macquarie University
Beau,
Asking for names is necessary for the post-enumeration evaluation of the accuracy of census data. Apparently it is also thought to increase the response rate for the census.thirdly, the last two censuses have allowed people to opt for their information to be retained to be accessed in the future by relatives , researchers and others. Clearly names are essential for genealogical purposes.
Dale,
I know that other information is also collected. However the population couldn't be estimated accurately if large numbers of people did not fill in the census. Hence it must be compulsory.
Andrew McNicol
PhD candidate (Media) at University of New South Wales
Actually, this is a very interesting question.
The short version is that there were very heated privacy concerns in the '70s regarding the census' collection of personal data - names in particular. The Law Reform Commission looked into it and produced a report in 1979 entitled 'Privacy and the Census'. (Link to the document: http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/other/alrc/publications/reports/12/12.pdf)
They found that removing names led to a significantly reduced level of accuracy because there was…
Read moreTim Scanlon
Author and Scientist
I don't see the problem with the census. The questions are general enough that the info collected wouldn't be of much use, especially not in comparison to your online footprint which is much easier to obtain.
Although I would like some of the questions rewritten to reflect current societal models. The ABS have a few statements on their website about the flaws in the questions. The one that annoyed me was the religion question which doesn't actually assess theistic and non-theistic proportions and denominations.
Gil Hardwick
Anthropologist
Of course, for us access to ABS data is fundamental. Without it we simply would not be able to do the work we do, or anywhere near as effectively.
Having said that, however, my fairly predictable rejoinder is that far too many 'researchers' these days see census data as the end of their job, not the start.
A second concern I have, which I share with many, is the propensity for alienation, for treating people as Other, as objects, mere numbers, rather than as human beings . . . I should say…
Read more