rid·dle 1 (rdl)
tr.v. rid·dled, rid·dling, rid·dles
1. To pierce with numerous holes; perforate: riddle a target with bullets.
2. To spread throughout: "Election campaigns have always been riddled with demagogy and worse" (New Republic).
3. To put (gravel, for example) through a coarse sieve.
ridden [ˈrɪdən]
vb
the past participle of ride
adj
(in combination) afflicted, affected, or dominated by something specified damp-ridden disease-ridden
You haven't seen this report, but "afflicted, affected, and dominated by" sounds just about right. A census report full of incorrect figures is a horrible thing to read. I've only picked out the obviously wrong ones - sentences that say things like "64.2 percent in 2011, down from 50.6 percent in 1991". Or numbers that are obviously a whole decimal point off. There's probably loads of non-obvious mistakes, like where the author typed something like 61,452 instead of 61,542, but I am not going to double check thousands of stats. Also, someone who doesn't even attempt to adjust monetary comparisons for inflation probably has no business writing a census analysis.







