April 1, Census Day, came and went, but if you didn’t fill in your census forms, it isn’t too late to do so, and we urge you to complete them.
With the coronavirus battering New York in every conceivable way — including financially — the state could use all the federal financial help it can get.
The federal government uses census data to determine the number of representatives states have in the U.S. House of Representatives. The 435 House seats are apportioned based on the population of each state. The larger its population, the more seats a state receives — and the greater the voice it has in federal decision-making.
The federal government also uses census data to distribute funding for programs like Medicare and Medicaid. In fact, a 2015 paper by the U.S. Census Bureau found that 132 federal programs used census data to distribute more than $675 billion in funds that year.
Here’s the thing: If a state is underrepresented in the decadal census, then it receives fewer representatives and less federal funding than it deserves, and New York, by many accounts, is typically undercounted in the census.