“None of the answers I gave were precise. Quite a few of them were guesses or “close-enoughs.” If the statisticians are using the data from 55,000 U.S. households to calculate the official, important, complete, and accurate final results, and 55,000 real-live, human, unique participants are approximating numbers and shrugging their shoulders about which radio button to select, then how helpful is that information?”

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Really great writeup from Indi Young on her own experience as a survey respondent for the Census Bureau. Entertaining, insightful, and thought-provoking.

Read the whole thing here: Who Can Believe the U.S. Unemployment Figures?