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Canada Reinstates Mandatory Census, To Delight of Social Scientists (sciencemag.org)
Eloking writes with news that the government of Liberal Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will be reinstating the mandatory long-form census that the outgoing government had ended. Science reports: "The new Canadian government today announced it would restore the country's mandatory long-form census. 'Our plan for open and fair government starts today with restoring the long-form census,' said Navdeep Bains, minister of innovation, science and economic development, speaking in Ottawa alongside Jean-Yves Duclos, minister of families, children and social development. 'We're focused on good evidence-based policies.' Bains said that Statistics Canada would be able to meet the 2 May deadline to roll out the 2016 census, which is conducted every 5 years, and that there would be no additional costs to making it mandatory. He confirmed that residents who fail to fill out the census could face criminal prosecution, an issue that contributed to the decision by the Harper government to make the 2011 census voluntary."
Oh, yes - making policy and decisions based on evidence as opposed to ideology - wild indeed. I'm buckled in tightly with a 5 point harness; I'm ready for this ride.
Ian Ameline
And may the gap in data go down in history as the "Stephen Harper knowledge gap"
No, their plan actually calls for making evidence based policy instead of simply deciding what they want the facts to be.
You know, collect information and use it to make decisions, instead of just making decisions based on ideology which has nothing to do with reality.
But, hey, go live in your mountain cabin and continue to believe this stupid crap.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
So, basically, you're against census even existing. Because the alternative is no census at all. A non-mandatory census is an absurdity.
There's nothing like $HOME
A census can only be mandatory. If its not mandatory, its a survey. Requiring residents to complete a census of their households is hardly onerous. At no time has anyone ever faced a fine or spent time in jail for failing to complete the census. There is a penalty, because under law you cannot have an action declared mandatory without a statement of penalty for failing to comply. A sign of good things to come. A return to rational, science and evidence based decision making. Not basing policy on unsupported beliefs and ideology.
If only we could fall into a woman's arms without falling into her hands
I don't have particular objections to the long form census, especially as I doubt they will come after you if you don't fill out all the questions, or answer erroneously (although considering the data is used for planning though this wouldn't necessarily seem to be in ones best interest).
However, it makes me worry that this is being presented as 'open and fair government'. I was really hoping Trudeau's campaign for 'real change' would include dropping the political blowing smoke up asses and not making every decision part of a heroic effort for 'open and fair government.'
You know, collect information and use it to make decisions
...Or just this decade (because no doubt, we don't do that anymore, amirite?), Uzbeks or Syrian Christians or Rohingya or Bodos or Burmese Muslims... Do I really need to go on?
Unfortunately, world history has a looong list of countries using such information "to make decisions" about how best to deal with Jews or Cossacks or Indians or Armenians or Japanese or Kurds or Sikhs or... I could go on, but you probably get the point.
But, hey, go live in your mountain cabin and continue to believe this stupid crap.
"I'm from the government and I'm here to help" has counted as the most terrifying phrase in the English language for centuries for a damned good reason. This doesn't require a tinfoil hat or a manifesto or a cabin in the woods; it requires nothing more than opening any major newspaper, turning on the evening news, listening to the morning news during your commute to work, skimming the headlines at Google News - To know why giving the government anything more than they absolutely need to perform their core functions, counts as a bad idea.
Or put another way - If my race, income, or education level has any impact on how many roads I get in my county, the government has already fucked up so badly we need them gone ASAP.
Take your tinfoil hats off already. I work for a civic agency where my primary role is to provide the decision makers with the right data necessary to make informed decisions. We, along with many other branches that serve the community, were severely handcuffed when Harper removed the long form and made the short form voluntary. The data is often used to help identify where focus and resources are best placed so that the taxpayers we serve get the most bang for their buck. Believe it or not, many public servants do understand who pays the bills.
The onerous nature of the questions lead to massive violations of privacy. NO citizen of any country should ever be compelled by force of law to reveal the private information of their lives. The government has ZERO right to know anything beyond the fact that I am alive and paying my taxes per the law. They don't need to know my skin color, my religion, what I do for a living, etc, etc.
The information they want to gather will only lead to the further degradation of the privacy of the citizens.
Bearded Dragon
It might help to think of government as something you buy.
Over the course of 5 years I’ll end up paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for my government services during that time.
Spending a few minutes every 5 years to ensure they know what my needs look like is a pretty small investment to ensure my “purchase” is working well.
I’m sure filling out this census once every 5 years takes less time than you’ve spent on your last major electronics purchase (which I would guess was a fraction of the cost, unless you’re buying a truckload of gold-plated uni-directional ethernet electron guide cables).
Also: nowhere do I spot the specific inane question that you posited. Care to reference a specific page?
The same Conservatives who passed Bill 51 to spy on all citizens and directly gather the information? Yes they really must love their privacy to vote in the most anti-privacy government in Canadian history.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
Uh canadians want it. That's why we turfed the conservatives. Anyone with any sort of science background, as well as pretty much all educated citizens do want the gathering of more information about the populace. Judging by trudeau's selection of ministers, he is doing a great job at putting people in power who are actually knowledgeable about what they are supposed to be the ministers of. I know good government is not something americans can comprehend, so i forgive you for your ignorance.
Considering youre an american, you can stfu with what you think canadians want as you are obviously not a canadian and not informed on these issues. You are just going off half cocked with your american crap rhetoric. Save it for your own government which we can all agree is corrupt as shit. But hey you put them there, so you have only yourself to blame.
Fix your own shit before commenting on other countries choices.
As a potential lottery winner, I totally support tax cuts for the wealthy