Daniel O. Price

A Check on Underenumeration in the 1940 Census

U NDERENUMERATION of underregistration is the bane of every census and of every Bureau of Vital Statistics the world over. Possibly the main difference in this connection between a good census set-up and a poor one is that the first will attempt some estimate of the proportion underenumerated while the latter will go blithely on in ignorance of the fact that it is missing some of the population. Two checks are possible: a sample check or a mass enumeration which would be both compulsory and subject to penalties. Spot samples, to anticipate our data by a glance forward at Tables i and 2, can vary so much from area to area that a mass census is indicated as the only valid check on enumeration. For the first time in history we are provided by the First Selective Service Registration with a check that fulfills the requirements, for it was compulsory on all males between 2i and 35 in I940 and was backed by adequate penalties. Other difficulties were present, however, and should not be underestimated as the following account will show. After estimating the amount of underenumeration for all classes and then for Negroes separately an attempt is made to evaluate the factors associated with the Census errors. The First Selective Service Registration was on October i6, I940, just six and one half months after the date of the Sixteenth Census. This registration stated that:

Examination of Two Sources of Error in the Estimation of Net Internal Migration

Abstract * Revision of a paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Population Association of America, Charlottesville, Virginia, May 8, 1954. Two sources of errors in the estimation of net internal migration are examined. First, errors arising from the use of a single set of survival rates in all 48 states are examined by estimating net migration in ten states using both a national life table and state life tables. It is estimated that the median error arising from this source is about 14 per cent of the estimate of net migration. The second source of error examined is underenumeration of the population. The “built in” correction factor of Census survival rates is demonstrated algebraically, and one approach is made to estimating the magnitude of errors from this source when the assumptions are not justified. It is estimated that about one-third of the estimates of net migration are in error by 25 per cent or more due to the effects of underenumeration. These two estimates of error are quite rough and ...

Overview of Demographic Trends and Characteristics by Color

The current social revolution in the United States may be related in a more significant sense than is generally recognized to demographic trends and characteristics of black Americans. These trends and characteristics-which include population growth, mobility and geographic distribution, and other social or economic characteristicshave important implications for the educational, economic and political development of the Negro population. An attempt will be made in this paper to sketch the highlights of these trends and characteristics, paying special attention to those not covered by other presentations at this conference.

Regionalism and the South: Selected Papers of Rupert Vance.

Rupert Vance is known as one of the principal developers of the intellectual apparatus of regional sociology, and he observed and commented for some fifty years on the problems and progress of his native region. In these wide-ranging articles, Vance masterfully combines data drawn from historical, demographic, geographical, and statistical sources with anecdotes, personal recollections, and a journalists ability to extract the telling image from a welter of complex circumstances.