The new method of the next german population census

This paper describes the concept of the next population and housing census in Germany (scheduled for 2011) and the main results of large-scale surveys carried out for testing the model of a register-based census in December 2001. The most important element of the new census method is the use of a combination of the two data collection methods: (i) The geographic and demographic characteristics of persons can be drawn from the population registers and the economic characteristics can be obtained from employee registers (which do not cover self-emloyed persons); (ii) As there are no nation-wide registers for buildings and dwellings, the characteristics on dwellings and buildings have to be collected through a postal survey contact of the owners of the buildings/dwellings. Other census characteristics not available from registers (e.g. educational or ecomomic characteristics for self-emloyed persons) have to be collected through a supplementary sample survey. The housing census also provides information on dwellings (name of one or two occupants and the number of occupants) which can be used to link the individual persons stored in the population registers to their dwelling in order to create information on private (dwelling) households. The new census approach will not only reduce census costs significantly - the costs for a traditional census would be about 1 billion euros, while the costs for a widely register-based census are estimated at about 340 million euros - but it will also involve a much smaller response burden on the population than would be imposed by a complete enumeration. After World War II, four population and housing censuses were carried out in Germany: in 1950, 1961, 1970 and 1987. This was done in a traditional way by interviewing inhabitants in a complete enumeration. The last census scheduled for spring 1981 had to be postponed twice. The first postponement was for cost reasons: the Federal States (Ldemanded a contribution from the Federal Government towards the expenses of the municipalities for the field operations. The second postponement was due to the cancellation of the census law by the Federal Constitutional Court in spring 1983. In autumn 1982, a politically motivated boycott movement against the population census started and resulted in numerous (about 1200) complaints from citizens against the constitutionality of the census law. Unexpectedly, the Supreme Court cancelled the census law. The main reason for this verdict was that the envisaged transmission of census microdata to the municipalities for the adjustment of the population registers was considered to be an infraction of the general right to privacy. This verdict is still in force. It means that administrative data may be transmitted from the administration authorities to the statistical offices, but no data on individual persons (collected in a statistical survey) may be transmitted back to the municipalities e.g. for the purpose of adjusting incorrect entries in the municipal population registers. The fear of the political decision-makers that a new complete enumeration of the population might prompt boycott movements like that of the eighties, together with the estimated high costs of a traditional census (about 1 billion Euros), led to the decision in the late nineties to no longer conduct a traditional