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While I understand the original purpose behind the decennial census (congressional representation), with the growth rate of much of the US these days, it is feasible for the decennial census to become a pentennial census, occurring every 5 years instead of every 10?

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While I understand the original purpose behind the decennial census (congressional representation), with the growth rate of much of the US these days, it is feasible for the decennial census to become a pentennial census, occurring every 5 years instead of every 10?

I think that would be a good idea to add a census in years ending in "5".

I don't see it happening though, since people are wary of privacy issues, fiscal costs of the endeavor, and also because it would probably require a constitutional amendment.

The Census Bureau does produce detailed annual estimates of every adminsitrative sub-entity, more detailed than anything I've seen any other nation do in the intracensal period.

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While I understand the original purpose behind the decennial census (congressional representation), with the growth rate of much of the US these days, it is feasible for the decennial census to become a pentennial census, occurring every 5 years instead of every 10?

It is in the US Constitution to do it this way and would take an amendment to the Constitution to change it. I don't think it would ever happen since amendments almost never make it through the process. The last amendment that made any real change to the Constitution was way back in the late 60s which lowered the voting age from 21 to 18. (the argument being that if soldiers were being sent off to be killed in Vietnam, they should at least have the right to vote for the idiots that are sending them off to war)

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I don't think you would have to change the Constitution to do a census more often, but rather to do it less often. While it would be nice to have a census every five years it would be really expensive and people don't like to be hassled by them to begin with.

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