Question #16
Occupants
Even though a dwelling is a place of abode meant to shelter one household it can be used to house more than one census household at the time of the census.
Census household: A census household is a person or group of persons, related or unrelated, who live under the same roof and who share a common budget in order to satisfy their basic needs.
a. How to carry out the investigation
The purpose of this topic is to find out the number of households, family nuclei, and occupants in each dwelling.
In order to determine the number of households, the occupants of the dwelling are asked if they defray their food and shelter costs with a common budget, or if there are different groups who defray their costs individually.
b. How to record the data
If all of the occupants share a common budget; that is, they constitute only one census household, the number "1" is written in the corresponding box. The information for each and every one of the persons in the household is then recorded in the part of the census form corresponding to "Persons in the census household".
If the dwelling is shared by two or more groups of persons, each defraying their costs separately, for each group constituting a census household the corresponding number
[p. 37]
is written in the space "Number of households". The information for the first household is then recorded in the part of the census form corresponding to "Persons in the census household". For the second household, a new census form is used. In the dwelling section of the new form, only the location information is recorded. In the "Persons in the census household" section the information of each of the household members is recorded. This pattern is followed for the successive households if they exist.
The annotations for number of nuclei and of occupants are made afterwards in the office.
c. Example:
[These instructions refer to a graph of question 16 on the census form]
Care should be taken to not confuse "More than one household in a dwelling" with "More than one dwelling in a building or house". According to the definition of a "Dwelling unit", if the households occupy separate and independent parts of a building, each one of these parts constitutes a dwelling.