The U.S. Census Bureau has been releasing 2010 Census data on a flow basis since February of this year. The most recent state-by-state data releases have contained counts of the population by age, race, and household type for geographic areas down to the census block level. Iowa’s data will be released some time during the summer of 2011.

Seasoned census data users will notice a change in the 2010 Census data products compared to previous census tabulations. Because the Census Bureau did not include a “long form” questionnaire in the 2010 Census, detailed socio-economic characteristics of the population and households will be absent from the 2010 data sets . The long form, part of every census since 1960, was used to gather detailed income, family, housing and other characteristics from a sampled subset of households. In this last census, all U.S. households received the same short, 10-question form.

Costs and other challenges associated with the long form contributed to the Census Bureau’s decision to re-engineer its decennial census approach for 2010. The Census Bureau has replaced the long form sample survey with a new instrument called the American Community Survey (ACS). This continuous, rolling survey should provide fresher data throughout the decade, addressing a frequent complaint from decennial data users.

The information gathered by the decennial census long form has been invaluable to grant-writers, planners, and social and political science researchers through the years. Adapting to the new ACS framework may require some adjustments by data users. The ACS estimates are not directly comparable to previous decennial census data. The sample size used for the ACS is smaller than the decennial long form sample, and the inclusion of confidence intervals will require more judgment in the use and reporting of values.

Iowa State University, through its affiliation with the State Data Center of Iowa, will provide ongoing assistance to data users with questions about the ACS.

More detailed information about the American Community Survey is available at the following link: http://www.recap.iastate.edu/briefingrooms/showitem.php?id=67

Information courtesy of Liesl Eathington, leathing@iastate.edu