[magellan]

Originally Posted by Mayorofsynsky

I think grossly overestimating the accuracy of government records. If the government believed its records were perfect, it would not devote tremendous resources to the census.

Even if birth and death records are completely accurate, it would still be difficult to track people moving in and out of the state and the homeless.

Second thread where you're either repeating something I already said (but making it contradictory), or contradicting something I didn't say. What's up with that?

[Indentured Servant]

Originally Posted by Mayorofsynsky

I don't think you can conclude MI is growing. The increase of 0.1% is within the margin of error for the data collection. For those who see the glass as half full, you can't conclude MI's pop is shrinking.

I think the real deal is to not focus on points in time, but rather, trends. I think the evidence shows that Michigan is trending, in terms of population growth, more positive.

[actinic]

Census figures reflect residents, not inhabitants. Therein lies a major flaw, especially in a state like Michigan. Why? Look at all the former residents that still snowbird it back here during the summer. Many have sold their MI homes and now rent ... or stay with relatives. That group falls under the radar.

Look at the winter vs summer increase in activity here. Yes, some of it is vacationers but my guess is the majority are previous residents coming back part time. My guess is that on ANY block in this state there's a few homes that sit empty during the winter. You've seen it.

I haven't seen a definitive analysis on this subject but would imagine that indirect evidence (fuel/food consumption or energy use) might help.

[Indentured Servant]

Originally Posted by actinic

Census figures reflect residents, not inhabitants. Therein lies a major flaw, especially in a state like Michigan. Why? Look at all the former residents that still snowbird it back here during the summer. Many have sold their MI homes and now rent ... or stay with relatives. That group falls under the radar.

Look at the winter vs summer increase in activity here. Yes, some of it is vacationers but my guess is the majority are previous residents coming back part time. My guess is that on ANY block in this state there's a few homes that sit empty during the winter. You've seen it.

I haven't seen a definitive analysis on this subject but would imagine that indirect evidence (fuel/food consumption or energy use) might help.

That is something that I never thought about. Thanks for that!

One of my beliefs, also, is that Detroit's population count has not been consistent. I don't know how many people actually reside in the city, but I certainly do not believe that the city population dropped by 250,000 people last census.....not in a ten year period......no way. The reason for my skepticism, as I explained before, is that Detroit's official 2000 census count was ~900,000. That is what the government COUNTED, boots on the ground. It was only after multiple cities filed suit concerning minority under counting, that Detroit's population was adjusted upward by 54,000 I believe. The 2010 census, the one in which Detroit supposedly lost 250,000 people (based upon the ADJUSTED 2000 count of 954,000), there was no adjustments after the official count. In other words, what was done in 2000 was not done in 2010. Had there not been a 2000 adjustment, then the loss for the 2010 enumeration would have been about 190,000 and not 250,000. Comparing the boots on the ground counting from 2000-2010....the loss was overstated by 63,000.....given the 2010 boots on the ground count of 713,000 vs. 900,000 boots on the ground count of 2000.

That said, there was another major inconsistency between 2000 and 2010. In all years, begin with Coleman Young, in which Detroit population loss became an issue with trying to meet the population threshold to be eligible for funds for cities of a certain size, there have been massive efforts and campaigns by the city to get everyone counted. The city made a big push each census to advertise and solicit that everyone and they momma be counted, because funding depended upon it. However, in 2010, Mayor Bing made no such effort. With the oversupply of housing in the city and the propensity of squatting, and not wanting to be known to be squatting out of fear, likely many people in Detroit were missed. I do not know how many more people could have been counted with a similar effort as previous years, but I am positive that it was more than zero. Thus, in total, my best estimate or hypothesis is that Detroit lost about 175-185,000 people between 2000 and 2010 and not the headline total of a quarter of a million.

The thing that gets me is that nowhere in the media or in any sort of blog or publication have I read about these inconsistencies that are FACTUAL inconsistencies that impact the population count. No one ever said...."well....the loss was bad.....but probably not as bad as is being said" (Actually Bing and others who predicted a count of 800,000 did question it). When something bad happens to Detroit it seems that people simply take it and run with it. No one seems to question the veracity of of bad news for Detroit......only good news goes through scrutiny. I bet if Detroit were to gain 10,000 people the next census, the media, blogs and thousands of individuals would be checking into methodologies and questioning things and checking for inconsistencies. The media and people are heavily invested in promoting bad news for Detroit. In fact, many other cities experienced the same thing....given that there was not a readjustment to their counts for minority under counts. This is why so many cities appeared to have a record loss of black residents....because the adjustment done after the census increased the minority totals for the 2000 census, after the official count. In other words, if they counted 200,000 blacks in Kansas City in 2000, then adjusted the count to 210,000, not adjusting the count in 2010 would mean an automatic loss of 10,000 blacks, if they counted 200,000 blacks in 2010.

[emily hayes]

Still, every year the population increases. In particular, there Michigan 9928358 people.[url=http://worldpopulationclock.info/usa/michigan]Michigan population clock live - current population of Michigan (USA)[/url]