Survey Nonresponse Warps Economic Data

Plummeting participation in government surveys is degrading the quality of flagship indicators like the jobs report, leading to big backward revisions and public confusion. The same dynamics—survey fatigue and caller ID screen‑outs—now afflict the census and labor surveys alike. As precision falls, the data become easier political targets. — When core economic facts get noisier, policy, markets, and public trust are destabilized and the door opens to politicizing official statistics.