---
title: "Current Population Survey"
type: "entity"
entity_kind: "concept"
status: "hub"
canonical_name: "Current Population Survey"
aliases: ["CPS","March CPS","CPS-ORG"]
first_seen: "2026-07-11T00:00:00.000Z"
writer_model: "claude-sonnet-5"
connects_to: ["Mariel Boatlift","George Borjas","Michael Clemens","measurement artifact","1980 census"]
---


The US survey instrument (March Supplement and May/Outgoing Rotation Group extracts) whose differing sample sizes and a documented pre-1980-census push to improve coverage of low-skill Black men are the central mechanism in the Clemens & Hunt argument that George Borjas's measured Mariel Boatlift wage effect is a compositional-sampling artifact rather than a real labor-market response. Borjas's own reply uses the survey's year-to-year figures against that argument, showing the Black-share jump concentrated in a single 1978-to-1979 transition, decoupled in time from the wage decline he attributes to the Boatlift.

## References
- [[claim-mariel-wage-effect-may-be-1980-census-methodology-artifact]] · [[claim-borjas-timing-rebuttal-mariel-black-share-flat-during-wage-drop]] · [[claim-mariel-wage-effect-depends-on-race-adjustment-model-choice]]
- Captures: 2026-07-29-does-the-clemens-hunt-argument-that-borjass-mariel