can I get in any trouble for not doing so?
it does say required by law that I respond, nothing about actually filling out the form.
my personal response would be less than cordial to be honest. I am about as interested in helping provide info to help with things like redistricting as I am in extra holes in my head.
Title 13 us code is being quoted at me, sections 141 and 193 and something about title 18 as well (as changed by title 18)
It’s, generally, beneficial for you and your community to accurately complete census forms.
They can, and do, use the law to require compliance. There’s really no down side, so failing to cooperate is usually based on misunderstanding, or some political rebellion.
Here’s the U.S. Code: http://www.access.gpo.gov/uscode/title13/chapter7_subchapterii_.html
I really can’t think of a circumstance in which participating in the census would be to your detriment… but I can think of dozens of ways in which it could help you.
Besides, congressional redistricting is based on the full census conducted every ten years. That’s not what this is for.
Your great grandkids will be pissed when they can’t find you in the household level data, you know.
They will threaten you with fines or such, for not complying. I don’t remember what the exact penalties are. Persons that think it simple obviously didn’t get the long form like I did last time. I don’t know how long it was exactly but I’m thinking about 15 pages. It pissed me off, and had the penalty not been there it would have gone in the garbage. One or two pages fine. A fricking book sucks.
I can empathize w/ not wanting to fill out census forms. It certainly seems like an invasion of privacy. On the otherhand, I worked the 1980 census. I wasn’t an enumerator, thankfully, so I didn’t have to deal w/ people face to face. I worked in the office, compiling the data and segregating it into categories. This was in Phoenix and we had many problems because of illegal immigrants, on top of the normal percentage of people who just rebelled against the invasion of their privacy. This was especially true of the long forms, as **Harmonious Discord ** points out. On top of everything else, Phoenix is full of snowbirds, who consider themselves to be residents of somewhere else than Arizona. It was an interesting job, to say the least.
Just fill out the form and send it back, it’s not a battle worth fighting.
For those who haven’t clicked through, a person can be fined up to $100 for refusing to answer a census question, and can fined up to $500 for giving a false answer to a census question.
I got the long form several years ago. It took maybe 20 minutes to fill out, not a real big imposition on my life in the grand scheme of things.
I worked the 2000 census as an enumerator, I don’t remember them telling us anything about it being illegal not to respond. My tracts were in a primarily hispanic portion of Los Angeles, so needless to say I found more than a few households that didn’t want to respond.
Anyhow, we did have to report to our supervisor which households did not respond and gave them the file. What happened after that I’d be quite curious to know.
I had to do the long form in 1990. I don’t think my answers were very helpful.
For a census surely all respondents’ answers are helpful?
Ummmmmm…not really. Unless I’ve morphed into a Samoan national with 36 kids without noticing.
Assuming I’m understanding you here, what possible motivation could you have to lie?
I was bored and I consider the long form a gross invasion of my privacy. I don’t care why the Gubmint feels they have to know how many flush toilets are in my residence. I don’t feel like fucking telling them. 
Well, no offense intended, but that seems rather childish. If you don’t want them to know, then just don’t send it in. What you did is like an elementary schoolkid writing “I. C. Weiner” in the class roster. As pointed out, answering accurately is more to your benefit than not, since the census helps the government figure out how to allocate resources.
Guilty. But I had fun with it, so that’s a plus.
Breaking the law is a barrel of laughs.
Sometimes, yes.
I admit to being childish on this, but I don’t regret it. I don’t care why they want the info, I just don’t feel like giving it to them.
That’s all well and good, but you could have gotten the same result by just not sending in the form at all. As noted above, that might only cost you a maximum of $100. OTOH, knowingly providing false information as you have done can cost you up to $500. Where’s the sense in that?