This year, respondents will be given multiple days to complete the census, which collects key demographic, social and economic data from everyone in the country. There are just two optional questions included in the census: the respondent’s religion, and their willingness to participate in the Census Time Capsule.

A capsule containing respondents’ complete census data from each event is stored at the National Archives for 99 years, after which it is released publicly.

Demographer Mark McCrindle says storing the information will benefit our descendants a century down the track.

“How grateful we are when we may be on an ‘ancestry.com’-type situation [and] someone’s got the marriage certificate or some birth data details.

“We’re glad that forebears have it and I’m sure that future [descendants] will be glad to dig into a bit of detail about who those ancient ancestors of theirs were.”

You can read more at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Australian_census.