Republican Anti-Intellectualism

The Republican War On Data

This is part of a long-term effort to eliminate data collection or pervert it so that policy is biased toward Republican priorities. For example, Republicans have:

• Forced the Internal Revenue Service to drop a program called the Taxpayer Compliance Measurement Program in order to make the extent of tax evasion harder to calculate. This has made it easier to cut the IRS budget. 

• Abolished the Office of Technology Assessment and the Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations because they often produced widely respected data that conflicted with Republican dogma on issues such as global warming.

• Prohibited the federal government from collecting data on the cost of gun-related injuries and death in order to prevent it from being used by gun control supporters.

• Are currently attempting to defund a Census Bureau program called the American Community Survey. Among other things, it would eliminate the government’s ability to properly calculate the unemployment rate. Republicans claim it is too intrusive.