WRONG!!!
The letter was to let me know to look for the Census which is coming next week. Ummmm, ok. I have spent the last 2 months already wondering why the government felt compelled to run commercials every 5 minutes for something that wasn't happening til March... how much did that cost?! Now, they also decided it made sense to pay to mail out pre-census letters to the whole country. WOW. I'm pretty sure that the people that opened that letter to read it also would have opened the census without an early warning letter. People who would ignore the census are also likely to ignore the letter... just sayin.
You know what really gets me? They spent all this money on advertising and letters and didn't take the time or money to set up a system for taking the census online. I may be wrong (I'm not) but I think the best way to increase participation in the census is not to run a bazillion ads, but to have a system in place to allow people to take it online quickly and easily. Not exactly a shocker that our gov't is in total financial ruin, now is it?
12 comments:
That's exactly what I thought when I opened the letter yesterday...I wonder where you get it from?
I got TWO "the census is coming!" letters. Definitely a waste of money, stamps, paper...
ditto your comments and those above, plus adding an on-line form would improve efficiency by cutting out a processing step and allowing direct input of data.
Move over...I'm with you on the soapbox.
Gran
I'm beginning to think that the US needs a turnaround specialist CEO, not a president. You know, the kind of heartless guy that will come in and just cut things until revenue exceeds expenses. Fun facts: the Census Bureau requested $1.3 billion for postage in 2010 and the advertising budget for this census is $300 million.
I agree Ben. We really need someone to come in for 4 yrs who won't mind being hated and cut waste!
They can hire me for $1 billion and I will design the system and even purchase the software and hardware needed to do this. Give them $100 million for advertising and save 1/2 billion just this year. That would be $1.5 billion in savings per year. Snap, I'll even throw in voting and some other things for my fee :)
I haven't seen the commercials (DVR, I guess), but I thought the same thing when I opened the letter . . . what a waste!
well said. we've thought the same things in our house :)
I'm liking this soapbox.... It isn't as lonely as they normally are ;-)
Dear Abby,
I agree with your Gran. You need to get a bigger soapbox!
Agreed - I got ours yesterday and was thoroughly annoyed with the wastefulness. My only consolation came when I threw it into the recycling bin in hopes that it becomes something much more useful in its next life.
amen. i tore it up immediately out of disgust and put it in the recycling bin so at least something good could come out of it.
ps- LOVING baby girl's picture on our fridge. too cute.
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