We need to go back to the government out of the bedroom.
A group of Democratic senators have introduced a bill that would require the U.S. census to ask participants their gender identity and sexual orientation.
The bill, the Census Equality Act, would require the questions to appear on the forms beginning in 2030. They would also be added in 2020 to the American Community Survey, which 1 in 38 households are required by law to complete each year.
The information gained from the surveys helps lawmakers decide how to allocate more than $800 billion in federal spending. Supporters of the legislation say that adding the information on gender identity or sexual orientation would affect funding on Medicaid, a government healthcare program for low-income people, or the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, informally known as food stamps. It could also help fund more access to Section 8 housing vouchers, which subsidize rent.
Estimates suggest that roughly 10 million people in the U.S. identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. Multiple studies have shown that people in this group are more likely than average to fall below the poverty line.
“The spirit of the census is that no one should go uncounted and no one should be invisible,” Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., one of the authors of the bill, said in a statement. “We must expand data collections efforts to ensure the LGBTQ community is not only seen, but fully accounted for in terms of government resources provided.”