SABEW calls on lawmakers to fund data collection

The Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing sent out the following statement on Thursday:

As the nation pores over news about workers and the workplace this Labor Day, many stories are based on data from federal and state governments. Data is critical to telling not just the stories of workers but of many aspects of our economic life.
That’s why the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing (SABEW) is alarmed by the growing number of cases where the integrity of government data is being undermined for political purposes and shortsighted penny-pinching.
SABEW calls on federal and state lawmakers to adequately fund data collection and analysis, to ensure that politics plays no role in the operation of statistical agencies. Lawmakers must ensure that the public has access to accurate data about the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the health of Americans.
On September 1, SABEW produced a virtual event with top officials from Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) and Census on the critical role that high-quality data plays in American society.
As we all enjoy a brief respite from our work responsibilities, SABEW reminds Americans to participate in Census 2020 and the data collection efforts of the BLS and BEA, among others.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.