(AP) The federal government is taking preliminary steps toward revising racial and ethnic classifications that have not been changed in a quarter century following calls for more accurate categories for how people identify themselves in federal data gathering.
The revisions could open the door to changes long desired by advocates on census and survey forms. Among them are a new category for people of Middle Eastern and North African descent who currently are classified as white and efforts to make categories less confusing for Hispanic participants.
The chief statistician of the U.S. said in a blog post Wednesday that her office was initiating a formal review of the race and ethnicity classifications maintained by the Office of Management and Budget which were first outlined in 1977 and have not been revised since 1997.
