IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/demogr/v56y2019i4d10.1007_s13524-019-00803-4.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Predicting the Effect of Adding a Citizenship Question to the 2020 Census

Author

Listed:
  • J. David Brown

    (U.S. Census Bureau)

  • Misty L. Heggeness

    (U.S. Census Bureau)

  • Suzanne M. Dorinski

    (U.S. Census Bureau)

  • Lawrence Warren

    (U.S. Census Bureau)

  • Moises Yi

    (U.S. Census Bureau)

Abstract

The addition of a citizenship question to the 2020 census could affect the self-response rate, a key driver of the cost and quality of a census. We find that citizenship question response patterns in the American Community Survey (ACS) suggest that it is a sensitive question when asked about administrative record noncitizens but not when asked about administrative record citizens. ACS respondents who were administrative record noncitizens in 2017 frequently choose to skip the question or answer that the person is a citizen. We predict the effect on self-response to the entire survey by comparing mail response rates in the 2010 ACS, which included a citizenship question, with those of the 2010 census, which did not have a citizenship question, among households in both surveys. We compare the actual ACS–census difference in response rates for households that may contain noncitizens (more sensitive to the question) with the difference for households containing only U.S. citizens. We estimate that the addition of a citizenship question will have an 8.0 percentage point larger effect on self-response rates in households that may have noncitizens relative to those with only U.S. citizens. Assuming that the citizenship question does not affect unit self-response in all-citizen households and applying the 8.0 percentage point drop to the 28.1 % of housing units potentially having at least one noncitizen would predict an overall 2.2 percentage point drop in self-response in the 2020 census, increasing costs and reducing the quality of the population count.

Suggested Citation

  • J. David Brown & Misty L. Heggeness & Suzanne M. Dorinski & Lawrence Warren & Moises Yi, 2019. "Predicting the Effect of Adding a Citizenship Question to the 2020 Census," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 56(4), pages 1173-1194, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:demogr:v:56:y:2019:i:4:d:10.1007_s13524-019-00803-4
    DOI: 10.1007/s13524-019-00803-4
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s13524-019-00803-4
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s13524-019-00803-4?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Oaxaca, Ronald, 1973. "Male-Female Wage Differentials in Urban Labor Markets," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 14(3), pages 693-709, October.
    2. J. David Brown & Misty L. Heggeness & Suzanne M. Dorinski & Lawrence Warren & Moises Yi, 2018. "Understanding the Quality of Alternative Citizenship Data Sources for the 2020 Census," Working Papers 18-38, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    3. Alan S. Blinder, 1973. "Wage Discrimination: Reduced Form and Structural Estimates," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 8(4), pages 436-455.
    4. Brittany Bond & J. David Brown & Adela Luque & Amy O’Hara, 2014. "The Nature of the Bias When Studying Only Linkable Person Records: Evidence from the American Community Survey," CARRA Working Papers 2014-08, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    5. J. David Brown & Misty L. Heggeness & Suzanne M. Dorinski & Lawrence Warren & Moises Yi, 2018. "Understanding the Quality of Alternative Citizenship Data Sources for the 2020 Census," Working Papers 18-38r, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    6. J. David Brown & Misty L. Heggeness & Suzanne M. Dorinski & Lawrence Warren & Moises Yi, 2019. "Predicting the Effect of Adding a Citizenship Question to the 2020 Census," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 56(4), pages 1173-1194, August.
    7. Mary Layne & Deborah Wagner & Cynthia Rothhaas, 2014. "Estimating Record Linkage False Match Rate for the Person Identification Validation System," CARRA Working Papers 2014-02, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. J. David Brown & Misty L. Heggeness & Suzanne M. Dorinski & Lawrence Warren & Moises Yi, 2019. "Predicting the Effect of Adding a Citizenship Question to the 2020 Census," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 56(4), pages 1173-1194, August.
    2. Bernhardt, Robert & Wunnava, Phanindra V., 2020. "The CPS Citizenship Question and Survey Refusals: Causal and Semi-Causal Evidence Featuring a Two-Stage Regression Discontinuity Design," IZA Discussion Papers 13350, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. J. David Brown & Misty L. Heggeness, 2024. "Citizenship Question Effects on Household Survey Response," Working Papers 24-31, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    4. Julia Heinzel & Rebecca Heller & Natalie Tawil, 2021. "Estimating the Legal Status of Foreign-Born People: Working Paper 2021-02," Working Papers 57022, Congressional Budget Office.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Brown, J. David & Heggeness, Misty L. & Dorinski, Suzanne M. & Warren, Lawrence & Yi, Moises, 2019. "Estimating the Potential Effects of Adding a Citizenship Question to the 2020 Census," IZA Discussion Papers 12087, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. J. David Brown & Misty L. Heggeness & Suzanne M. Dorinski & Lawrence Warren & Moises Yi, 2018. "Understanding the Quality of Alternative Citizenship Data Sources for the 2020 Census," Working Papers 18-38, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    3. J. David Brown & Misty L. Heggeness & Suzanne M. Dorinski & Lawrence Warren & Moises Yi, 2018. "Understanding the Quality of Alternative Citizenship Data Sources for the 2020 Census," Working Papers 18-38r, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    4. Thomas Y. Mathä & Alessandro Porpiglia & Michael Ziegelmeyer, 2014. "Wealth differences across borders and the effect of real estate price dynamics: Evidence from two household surveys," BCL working papers 90, Central Bank of Luxembourg.
    5. Matias Busso & Patrick Kline, 2008. "Do Local Economic Development Programs Work? Evidence from the Federal Empowerment Zone Program," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 1639, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    6. Marco Caliendo & Frank M. Fossen & Alexander Kritikos & Miriam Wetter, 2015. "The Gender Gap in Entrepreneurship: Not just a Matter of Personality," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 61(1), pages 202-238.
    7. Alison L. Booth, 2006. "The Glass Ceiling in Europe: Why Are Women Doing Badly in the Labour Market?," CEPR Discussion Papers 542, Centre for Economic Policy Research, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    8. Valentine Fays & Benoît Mahy & François Rycx, 2023. "Wage differences according to workers' origin: The role of working more upstream in GVCs," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 37(2), pages 319-342, June.
    9. Michael E. Martell & Peyton Nash, 2020. "For Love and Money? Earnings and Marriage Among Same-Sex Couples," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 41(3), pages 260-294, September.
    10. Howard Bodenhorn & Christopher Ruebeck, 2007. "Colourism and African–american wealth: evidence from the nineteenth-century south," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 20(3), pages 599-620, July.
    11. Huong Thu Le & Ha Trong Nguyen, 2018. "The evolution of the gender test score gap through seventh grade: new insights from Australia using unconditional quantile regression and decomposition," IZA Journal of Labor Economics, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 7(1), pages 1-42, December.
    12. Ward-Warmedinger, Melanie E., 1999. "Salary and the Gender Salary Gap in the Academic Profession," IZA Discussion Papers 64, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    13. Sieds, 2017. "Complete Volume LXXI n. 3 2017," RIEDS - Rivista Italiana di Economia, Demografia e Statistica - The Italian Journal of Economic, Demographic and Statistical Studies, SIEDS Societa' Italiana di Economia Demografia e Statistica, vol. 71(3), pages 1-150, July-Sept.
    14. Ilhom Abdulloev & Ira N Gang & Myeong-Su Yun, 2014. "Migration, Education and the Gender Gap in Labour Force Participation," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 26(4), pages 509-526, September.
    15. David Bravo Urrutia & Sergio Urzúa & Claudia Sanhueza, 2007. "Is There Labor Market Discrimination Among Professionals In Chile? Lawyers, Doctors And Business-People," Working Papers wp264, University of Chile, Department of Economics.
    16. Töpfer, Marina, 2017. "Detailed RIF decomposition with selection: The gender pay gap in Italy," Hohenheim Discussion Papers in Business, Economics and Social Sciences 26-2017, University of Hohenheim, Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences.
    17. Katie Meara & Francesco Pastore & Allan Webster, 2020. "The gender pay gap in the USA: a matching study," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(1), pages 271-305, January.
    18. Monsueto, Sandro Eduardo & Simão, Rosycler Cristal Santos, 2008. "The impact of gender discrimination on poverty in Brazil," Revista CEPAL, Naciones Unidas Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL), August.
    19. Thomas Bauer & Mathias Sinning, 2011. "The savings behavior of temporary and permanent migrants in Germany," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 24(2), pages 421-449, April.
    20. Nandita Saikia & Moradhvaj & Jayanta Kumar Bora, 2016. "Gender Difference in Health-Care Expenditure: Evidence from India Human Development Survey," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(7), pages 1-15, July.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:demogr:v:56:y:2019:i:4:d:10.1007_s13524-019-00803-4. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.