What will be the total impact of the 2010 Census in terms of employees hired to work on the project, and when can we expect to see the peak in census hiring?
Going over data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics I was able to create a graph that depicts the government employee staffing levels during the current 2010 census against the employment levels from the 2000 census.
The census, which takes place every decade, begins with a small amount of hiring by the government to prepare for the big day when the actual mailings go out to every home in the country. This preparation includes such tasks as taking the previous census data and updating it to current electronic database standards (so as comparisons can be made once the current census data is entered), a committee to work on what questions will be included in the mailing, legal advisors, and other office staff to support the project.
The largest jump in employees working for the census project occurs between 3 and 5 months after the mailings go out to the public. This is when the government hires the most temporary workers to be key punch operators (data entry specialists in today’s lingo). These are the people who will either scan and verify every document returned by the residents of the country, or will enter the entire data manually. More than likely it will be a cross between the two methods as no matter how easy you make a form someone will fill it out incorrectly and it will have to be entered manually.
We have been hearing for many months that the 2010 census will be adding jobs and will improve the employment situation for the country. On paper it will look good, for a while anyway. A great majority of people who are hired to work on the 2010 census will be gone once it is all wrapped up. Many before it is even completed.
The only employees left will be a handful of number crunchers who will spend months extracting every nuance of information from the massive computer database of information.
This month (March) the 2010 census questionnaires will be in the mail. If this census follows the time line as the census of 2000, then we can expect to see the largest hiring to take place around late June to late August of this year. On the graph you can see that hiring spike during the 2000 census (blue line) which was approximately 4 months after the questionnaires were mailed. That employment spike was a significant number of data entry specialists. And once the data is entered from all of the forms, those workers were let go soon after as evidenced on the graph by the large drop that followed.
It is with no doubt that the main stream media will be reporting the ‘total’ employment situation as greatly improving come late Spring and early Summer this year. But, once again, one only has to look underneath the veil to see where the numbers come from. In this situation it would appear that aside from any organic growth, if any, in the real economy that most of the employment gains in the months ahead will be temporary government workers.
I will update this graph when new data is issued each month.
Recent Posts:
- Economic Data and Earnings Schedule for July 27 2010
- Dallas Fed Manufacturing Index – Drops to Lowest Level Since July 2009
- Economic Data and Earnings Schedule for July 26, 2010
- Is The United States Worthy of a AAA Sovereign Rating?
- Crude Oil Market Summary 7/19/2010 to 07/23/2010
- Economic Data and Earnings Schedule for July 23, 2010
{ 1 comment }
Is the horizontal axis of this graph correct? I’m seeing a difference between what you wrote and what your graph shows. The graph shows the 27 months after the beginning of the census is the major spike in employment. Is that correct?
{ 2 trackbacks }