I recently saw a friend’s FB post about filling out the US census online, and so I wondered if the census bureau cared about American citizens living elsewhere. Apparently not because the online form won’t allow me to complete it.
Anyway, it got me to thinking: Does Taiwan conduct a census? I was here in 2010 and don’t remember one, but my memory is pretty faulty.
Taiwan has the household registry, so they don’t need to. I think.
Aren’t the police theoretically supposed to do a census every year? But they don’t have time so they just keep resubmitting the same data, as I understand it.
Edit: Source:
[…] The only change the KMT made was to introduce a system of individual police beats, modeled on the American system. In this system the individual policeman is responsible for two blocks. “Those are his people – he has their census records in his locker,” Jeff described it. He is supposed to go visit them once a year and updated the records. If the policeman has to get his quota of arrests, he goes to the jurisdiction next door – “you never want to disturb things in your own area,” Jeff said with a laugh. When they discover a brothel or a chop shop in an area, the policemen who controls it is punished, Jeff said, since he is responsible for knowing everything about his district, including who the troublemakers are. “You can see the intimate relationships that might arise in such a situation,” Jeff noted.
Policing is about administering populations at this very intense level, Jeff noted. He then asked us: how many people have ever had someone knock on their door to update the census records? Everyone chorused in the affirmative. How often does that happen? Not often.
Not often at all. I saw some cops the other day roll up, leave off two officers, roll off around the block, two cops take a photo of themselves at the door of some walkup, car rolls back, they get in and drive off. Mission accomplished, I suppose. They also have those absurd patrol sheets they have to check off and leave in boxes you see hung all over the place.
They will are supposed to do a sample survey this year. [I’m not sure how COVID19 affects on the census.]
It is a sample survey (人口及住宅普查) since the last time in 2010.
They did comprehensive census (戶口及住宅普查) five times in 1956, 1966, 1980, 1990, 2000, and two sample surveys in 1971 and 1976.
Two times of 臺灣戶口調查 in 1905 and 1915.
Five times of 臺灣國勢調查 in 1920, 1925, 1930, 1935, 1940.
臺灣五十年來統計戶口調查
http://twstudy.iis.sinica.edu.tw/twstatistic50/Pop.htm
第三章我國歷次普查辦理情形與遭遇困難問題 - 行政院主計總 處
News reports a census starting next month Nov 2020.
Sounds like they ask a lot of questions like languages, do you live at same place as household registration (~30% don’t), etc.
And the government says everything is confidential.
A census is actually made to find out if people have a bathroom, how many, a shower or a tub …
