3/10/2010

Census finding it very hard to hire many Hispanics in Texas and other states?

With unemployment high, you would think that it would be easy to fill the quotas for Hispanics to do the Census. If I read this article in the WSJ correctly, the claim is that there are so few legal Hispanics in some areas that they can't find anyone who qualifies.

But recruiting Latinos is hard for some of the same reasons they are difficult to count, recruiters say. Census workers must be proficient in English, pass a test to prove their math and map-reading skills, and preferably be U.S. citizens. (The bureau hires legal residents as a last resort if no citizens from a particular area are available.) In certain places, such as rural areas, Colonias or neighborhoods with a high proportion of undocumented immigrants "there may be a very small fraction who are eligible," said Mr. Salinas. . . .


The reason they can't find these workers then is because of the citizenship or legal resident citeria.

See also here for a discussion of how easy the test is and how they have dropped the drug test requirement.

Labels:

1 Comments:

Blogger Raven Lunatic said...

The reason they can't find these workers then is because of the citizenship or legal resident [criteria].

Possibly, but not necessarily. Another factor is that if the use language in those areas is not English, people who are available for the job would not achieve the required level of English proficiency.

You'll notice that while legal employability is necessary condition to work as a census worker, so is the ability to read a map, and I'm not certain how well some of the native citizens with whom I've attend university could do on that metric.

3/11/2010 8:02 PM  

Post a Comment

<< Home