This afternoon, I filled out the Canadian census and the voluntary Canada Household Survey. I’m not sure how close the latter is to the Long Form census that Harper nixed, but it was certainly more thorough than the short form, which asked almost nothing demographically, sociologically or historically useful. The survey asked questions about religion, education, ethnicity, employment, income, cost of housing and utilities, and use of services like schools (including public transit, which is particularly great–or would be if anything approaching a representative sample fills out the survey). Given what was included, I was surprised that there were no questions on other matters of public interest or concern: healthcare, public space, voting, etc. I did appreciate that they spared me 14 questions about household income by saying they could pull it from tax filings.
My favorite part? This is the first non-science fiction document I’ve encountered that mentions the 22nd century in a serious context. Per Canadian law, our complete answers will be available to researchers in 2103. Awesome. That’s actually a year that’s going to happen.