Of course there's legitimate interest on the part of both government agencies themselves and the public. I think the reason this cut went through was to appease some "big government is watching you" tin-hat paranoia.

It's also true, though, that I've observed major federal agencies deliberately ignoring the information in Stat Abs and either repeating the research themselves or paying some third party to have it done. The FCC comes to mind. Undoubtedly this is an effort to retrieve a result more favorable to a predetermined goal of action than what would be allowed based on the pre-existing Census Bureau data.

The FCC persists in speaking about lack of broadband internet access as "failure to adopt" rather than "inability to obtain" the service, despite clear enough evidence from the existing statistics that people outside major urban markets simply cannot get reliable broadband service at an affordable price.