Don't ask, don't ask
WHEN THE data looks bad, the Bush administration doesn't have to kill the messenger. It can kill the message.
The use of intelligence data was muddled in the months leading up to the Iraq war, so that the president never heard much of the skepticism inside US intelligence agencies about what weapons of mass destruction Saddam Hussein actually had.
In 2004, NASA scientist James Hansen complained that ``In my more than three decades in government, I have never seen anything approaching the degree to which information flow from scientists to the public has been screened and controlled as it is now." One troubling example is the muting of scientific findings on global warming.
The latest victim is the Survey of Income and Program Participation, a Census tool that tracks the same families over time and measures the impact of various programs on the economic well-being of families. SIPP data has been used by thousands of researchers to study issues such as the impact of unemployment insurance and how some adults get stuck in low-wage jobs.
Looking at the numbers is a step toward developing better policies. But President Bush's 2007 budget would eliminate the survey. Census officials say they have to operate on a tighter budget, and that they'll have a new survey by 2009. But this would leave several years uncovered -- creating a gap in the record at a time of great economic change, when the country is juggling tax cuts, spending cuts, and bills for the war. Congress should save SIPP, which costs only $32 million, and shut it down only after a better survey is up and running.
The larger issue at stake is whether policy decisions should be based on data or on ideology and anecdote. People still recall Ronald Reagan's complaint about a welfare queen, even though the facts didn't support his claim. The harm: Welfare was tarred as a refuge for the lazy, glossing over such grim factors of poverty as mental illness, sexual abuse, and drug dependency.
The obvious, positive choice for governments is to rely on data -- using technology to get information on how to improve lives.
State governments are moving forward, gathering more facts on everything from jobs and workers to human-service programs. For several years, Massachusetts has been rolling out its virtual gateway, making it easier for people to apply for benefits and for the state to collect data. Similarly, non profit organizations are increasingly setting up programs to care for people and collect data on their long-term outcomes.
Numbers don't always tell the whole story. But they can ground policy debates in the real world -- not the political one.
