More Waisted Tax Money 2010 Census

That could be cost effective for you but you got to figure out if that's true for you. Let's do some rough math to figure out whether it's worth it for taxpayers to pay for sending out these notification letters.

Given:
1. The government saves 85 million (http://2010.census.gov/news/releases/operations/2010-census-ad-campaign-positioned-to-save-taxpayers-millions-helping-boost-mail-back-participation.html) for every 1 percent of forms returned.
2. The current estimate (http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:qrDGHO1wIhIJ:www.census.gov/prod/1/pop/p25-1129.pdf+number+of+houses+in+the+united+states&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESgfO6vop6_4-L_xcXOoj6A3-PZ_570gTmADQY070UhCkLL6VYI_xVdKhaQVOL2Z3LzaNa87Wek riEGek0swSW19gDmEKH0ZmlpXsJUJ7wsz-AqkXnVxzjjrqnPMnNXXWU_smnvN&sig=AHIEtbRoQqTfe8W_V104xaG-4toXsP8pcw) of the number of households in the united states is 115 million which implies 115 million notification letters will initially be sent out (assuming since we really don't know if everyone was sent a notification letter).
3. The USPO bulk mail rate (http://dbcalc.usps.com/CalculatorSetPage.aspx) is $0.233 per mail (this number is conservative).

If you do the math it costs the government $26,795,000 (115 million * 0.233) to send these notification letters. At cost of ~27 million and the potential of saving 510 million to 1.02 billion sending these notifications is a no brainer even if you don't take into consideration printing cost. Hell, if sending these notification gets 0.5% more people to respond you should send them out!


Got mine yesterday the printing cost should be fairly low on these all the paper that was used was very low quality.

That could be cost effective for you but you got to figure out if that's true for you. Let's do some rough math to figure out whether it's worth it for taxpayers to pay for sending out these notification letters.

Given:
1. The government saves 85 million (http://2010.census.gov/news/releases/operations/2010-census-ad-campaign-positioned-to-save-taxpayers-millions-helping-boost-mail-back-participation.html) for every 1 percent of forms returned.
2. The current estimate (http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:qrDGHO1wIhIJ:www.census.gov/prod/1/pop/p25-1129.pdf+number+of+houses+in+the+united+states&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESgfO6vop6_4-L_xcXOoj6A3-PZ_570gTmADQY070UhCkLL6VYI_xVdKhaQVOL2Z3LzaNa87Wek riEGek0swSW19gDmEKH0ZmlpXsJUJ7wsz-AqkXnVxzjjrqnPMnNXXWU_smnvN&sig=AHIEtbRoQqTfe8W_V104xaG-4toXsP8pcw) of the number of households in the united states is 115 million which implies 115 million notification letters will initially be sent out (assuming since we really don't know if everyone was sent a notification letter).
3. The USPO bulk mail rate (http://dbcalc.usps.com/CalculatorSetPage.aspx) is $0.233 per mail (this number is conservative).

If you do the math it costs the government $26,795,000 (115 million * 0.233) to send these notification letters. At cost of ~27 million and the potential of saving 510 million to 1.02 billion sending these notifications is a no brainer even if you don't take into consideration printing cost. Hell, if sending these notification gets 0.5% more people to respond you should send them out!

Good post but your numbers are wrong. The article in your link talks about all their advertising saving us 85 million not this mailing. I'm guessing they have been taking some heat over this so they through together this letter and those numbers.

I don't believe you know me well enough to know that I would have hated it if Bush had done it.
There is no such thing as free advertising. I'm confidant you're aware of this.
You don't address the issue of cost effectiveness of the ad. You look at the 2.4 million price tag like a Neanderthal would and pound your chess while screaming "oga-buga" with glee and ignorance.


Check this out, yeah, according Nielson the SB had 105.97 million viewers (http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/playoffs/2009/news/story?id=4897094). At 2.5 million price tag (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/02/03/taxpayers-fork-million-single-census-ad-super-bowl/) the cost of the ad per viewer is ~0.024 cents. Bang!
I actually don't have a problem with the double mailing, I understood the practicality of a notification letter before the census. I spoke of the SB commercial, because regardless of your statistics above, the government is already reaching out to houses via the mailing, the schools, and the market that is watching the SB will generally get counted. Maybe I am falling into a stereotyping trap, but if you are going to spend money for the census, you should focus the efforts on the areas and people who are likely to be uncounted, and those watching the SB don't fit into that. I could be 100% off base on this one, and I certainly feel that I have seen enough of your posts to have a basic understanding of how you quantify things, so I stand by my statement about Bush, you just would have blasted it on a different basis, maybe not doing enough to reach other areas, or some other equally statistically valid argument.


oohhooohh ahhhahhh eeeeheeeh

It worked in 2000, so why not now? I don't recall anyone crying about this back then.

Because of the higher response rate the Census Bureau saved at least $305 million and returned that money to Congress following the census. The advertising campaign in the 2000 Census cost about $100 million, a $205 million return on investment.

Secretary of Commerce Don Evans testified before the Senate in 2001 and praised the Census Bureau for its outreach efforts. "The Bureau successfully implemented paid advertising for the first time in Census 2000, placing over $100 million in media buys designed to educate and motivate the public to respond," Secretary Evans said.

Received my waste-of-money letter yesterday. So did my father-in-law, who immediate said "They sure know how to waste our money, don't they?" :Flush: :Flush:

It worked in 2000, so why not now? I don't recall anyone crying about this back then.

bada boom

Good post but your numbers are wrong. The article in your link talks about all their advertising saving us 85 million not this mailing. I'm guessing they have been taking some heat over this so they through together this letter and those numbers.
its funny how when you disagree with something, the numbers are always wrong. how about backing up your claim with some facts?

Just because I'm crazy doesn't mean I'm wrong.

its funny how when you disagree with something, the numbers are always wrong. how about backing up your claim with some facts?

Or you could just read my first post and follow the link in it:

It's a way to funnel some much needed cash to the post office. Or it could be that there is real benefit (http://www.kyw1060.com/US-Census-Bureau-Explains-Its-Pre-Mailing-Mailing/6533512) to sending these letters:

Just because I'm crazy doesn't mean I'm wrong.

Have you heard of the infinite monkey theorem (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinite_monkey_theorem)?