Guidelines released on how the 2010 Census will process same-sex marriage data

Thursday, 20 August 2009

New guidelines have been released on how same-sex married couples will be counted in the 2010 Census.

According to a new decision issued by the Counsel for the Secretary of Commerce, the Defense of Marriage Act does not require the Census Bureau to edit responses from same-sex couples identifying each other as a husband or wife.

Although the recoding process that reclassifies same sex couples as "unmarried partners" is embedded in the 2010 coding process, the Census Bureau will in late 2011 release the raw relationship data from the 2010 Census surveys in which these responses are not recoded. In Fall 2009, a report of unedited relationship responses based on the 2008 American Community Survey will be released. Examining this data will inform the 2010 tabulation and reporting of same-sex couples.

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