Saturday, March 20, 2010

A very funny take on the census form

For your reading pleasure, this post by Mark Draughn on Windypundit: Census Form! Entrapment! Beware!

An excerpt:
I just got my 2010 Census form in the mail. I assume some of you got one too. You may have noticed that the cover letter includes the following paragraph:

This is your official 2010 Census form. We need your help to count everyone in the United States by providing basic information about all the people living in this house or apartment. Please complete and mail back the enclosed census form today.

Today, huh? So, you take a look at the form, which seems otherwise well designed, and this is the first question you see:

How many people were living or staying in this house, apartment, or mobile home on April 1, 2010?

Uh, that's just over two weeks in the future, so what should you put down? At first, you're tempted to guess, but a piece of the federal Census law in 13 U.S.C. 221 says:

(b) Whoever, when answering questions described in subsection (a) of this section, and under the conditions or circumstances described in such subsection, willfully gives any answer that is false, shall be fined not more than $500.

And it goes on from there....

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