State and County-Level Response Rates – Week ending April 19

  North Carolina: Census 2020 Real-Time Response Rates – Week ending April 19 (.pdf)

  View All County-Level Response Rates – Week ending April 19

Key takeaways for week ending April 19

1. North Carolina’s ranking falls for the first time since reporting began. As of April 19^th, North Carolina ranked 38 out of 50 states and DC – a decline from last week’s ranking of 36. North Carolina’s current response rate stands at 46.6% of households.
2. Nationwide phone/mail response rate climbed substantially last week, nearly meeting NC’s mail response rate. 6.5% of households in the nation have now responded by mail or phone – up 0.8 percentage points from last week (April 12^th). This is compared to 6.7% of NC households, a gap of 0.2 percentage points. In the previous four weeks, the gap between NC and the nation averaged 0.7 percentage points.
3. Eight southeastern states outrank North Carolina in self-response – up from 7 last week. These are Virginia (55.7%), Kentucky (53.0%), Tennessee (49.8%), Alabama (49.3%), Florida (48.7%), Mississippi (48.1%), Georgia (47.7%), and Arkansas (46.8%).
4. Gap of 39 percentage points between highest-responding county and lowest-responding county in NC. 56.8% of households have responded in Orange County, ranked first among counties in North Carolina, compared to 17.7% of households in Graham County, ranked 100^th. This represents a gap of 39.1 percentage points overall. As mentioned in previous newsletters, NC’s lowest-ranking counties have been especially hard-hit by the suspension of Census operations due to COVID-19.
5. Over half of households have responded in all of North Carolina’s top-five responding counties. These counties are: Orange (56.8%), Union (56.6%), Wake (55.9%), Chatham (54.3%), and Davie (51.9%). Response in our highest-responding counties still lags self-response in the highest responding state of Minnesota (60.4%).
6. The response rate for tracts with high shares of young children lag behind state overall response rate. 45.5% of households have responded to the Census in census tracts where 7.2% of the population or higher are ages 0-4 – a gap of 1.1 percentage points from the state response rate. This represents the second-lowest-responding group, behind census tracts with the lowest share of young children (44.5%).
7. Census tracts with smallest shares of foreign-born residents have the lowest response rates. An average of 42.8% of households responded to the Census in tracts where less than 2.9% of residents are foreign-born – 3.8 percentage points below the state average. Census tracts with the largest share of foreign-born residents (9.8% or higher) had an average response rate of 48.4% – 1.8 percentage points above the state.
8. Lowest response rates in tracts with the largest and smallest shares of minority residents. In tracts where less than 14% of the population was non-white, the average response rate was 46.5% – 0.1 percentage point below the state. This gap has remained steady for several weeks. Meanwhile, in tracts where 50% or more of the population was non-white, the average response rate was 41.5% – 5.1 percentage points below the state. This gap has risen each week.
9. Over half of households have responded in census tracts with high internet access. In census tracts where less than 12% of households lack internet access, the average response rate was 54.9% – 8.3 percentage points above the state. This is the highest-performing state target group.

Last updated: 4.21.20