Steven Ruggles

videos

IPUMS-AIR Video Pitch January 2026

MacArthur Fellowship Video October 2022

Presidential Address Video Social Science History Association, Chicago, November 23, 2019

Presidential Address Video Population Association of America, San Diego, May 1 2015

selected publications

Steven Ruggles. 1987. Prolonged Connections: The Rise of the Extended Family in Nineteenth-Century England and America (University of Wisconsin Press, 1987)

Steven Ruggles. 2026. "The pig in the python: US decennial labor flows and economic opportunity, 1910-2040." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 122(11): e2424655122

Steven Ruggles. 2025. "The shortcomings of synthetic census microdata." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 122(11): e2424655122

Steven Ruggles. 2024. "When Privacy Protection Goes Wrong: How and Why the 2020 Census Confidentiality Program Failed." Journal of Economic Perspectives 38(2): 201-226

Steven Ruggles and Diana Magnuson. 2023. "'It's none of their damn business': Privacy and Disclosure Contol in the U.S. Census, 1790-2020." Population and Development Review 49(3): 651-679

Steven Ruggles. 2023. "Collaborations Between IPUMS and Genealogical Organizations, 1999-2022." Historical Life Course Studies 13: 1-8

Diana Magnuson and Steven Ruggles. 2022. "Challenges of large-scale data processing in the 1990s: The IPUMS Experience." IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 44: 71-83

Steven Ruggles. 2022. "Race, Class, and Marriage: Components of Race Differences in Men's First Marriage Rates in the United States, 1960-2019." Demographic Research 46: 1163-1186

Steven Ruggles and David Van Riper. 2022. "The Role of Chance in the Census Bureau Database Reconstruction Experiment." Population Research and Policy Review 41: 781-788

Jonas Helgertz, Joseph Price, Jacob Wellington, Kelly Thompson, John Robert Warren, Steven Ruggles, and Catherine Fitch. 2021. "A new strategy for linking U.S. historical censuses: A case study for the IPUMS Multigenerational Longitudinal Panel." Historical Methods 55: 12-29

Steven Ruggles. 2021. "The Revival of Quantification: Reflections on Old New Histories." Social Science History 45: 1-25.

Steven Ruggles and Diana Magnuson. 2020. "Census Technology, Politics, and Institutional Change, 1790-2020." Journal of American History 107: 19-51

David Van Riper, Tracy Kugler, and Steven Ruggles. 2020. "Disclosure Avoidance in the Census Bureau's 2010 Demonstration Data Product." In Josep Domingo-Ferrer and Krishnamurty Muralidhar, eds., Privacy in Statistical Databases. 353-369.

Steven Ruggles and Diana Magnuson. 2020. "Quantification in History: Journal of Interdisciplinary History as a Case Study." Journal of Interdisciplinary History 50: 363-382.

Steven Ruggles, Catherine Fitch, Diana Magnuson, and Jonathan Schroeder. 2019. "Differential Privacy and Census Data:Implications for Social and Economic Research." AEA Papers and Proceedings 109: 403-408

Steven Ruggles, Catherine Fitch, and Evan Roberts. 2018. "Historical Census Record Linkage." Annual Review of Sociology 44: 19-37

Steven Ruggles. 2016. "Marriage, Family Systems, and Economic Opportunity in the United States Since 1850." In S. M. McHale et al. (eds.) Gender and Couple Relationships (Heidelberg: Springer), pp. 3-41

Steven Ruggles, Tracy A. Kugler, Catherine A. Fitch, and David C. Van Riper. 2015. "Terra Populus: Integrated Data on Population and Environment.." 2015 IEEE International Conference on Data Mining Workshop (ICDMW) 222-231.

Steven Ruggles. 2015. "Patriarchy, Power, and Pay: The Transformation of American Families, 1800-2015." Demography, 52: 1797-1823

Steven Ruggles, Robert McCaa, Matthew Sobek, and Lara Cleveland. 2015. "The IPUMS Collaboration: Integrating and Disseminating the World's Population Microdata." Journal of Demographic Economics, 81: 203-216

Sheela Kennedy and Steven Ruggles. 2014. "Breaking up is Hard to Count: The Rise of Divorce in the United States, 1980-2010." Demography, 51: 587-298

Steven Ruggles. 2014. " Big Microdata for Population Research." Demography, 51: 287-297

Steven Ruggles. 2012. "The Future of Historical Family Demography." Annual Review of Sociology, 38: 423-441.

Lara Cleveland, Robert McCaa, Steven Ruggles, and Matthew Sobek. 2012. "When Excessive Perturbation Goes Wrong and Why IPUMS-International Relies Instead on Sampling, Suppression, Swapping, and Other Minimally Harmful Methods to Protect Privacy of Census Microdata." Privacy in Statistical Databases 2012, 179-187.

Steven Ruggles. 2011. "Intergenerational Coresidence and Family Transitions in the United States, 1850-1880." Journal of Marriage and the Family, 73: 136-148.

Steven Ruggles, Matthew Schroeder, Natasha Rivers, J. Trent Alexander, and Todd K. Gardner. 2011. "Frozen Film and FOSDIC Forms: Restoring the 1960 Census of Population." Historical Methods 44: 69-78.

Matthew Sobek, Lara Cleveland, Sarah Flood, Steven Ruggles, and Matthew Schroeder. 2011. "Big Data: Large-Scale Historical Infrastructure from the Minnesota Population Center." Historical Methods 44: 61-68.

Steven Ruggles, Evan Roberts, Sula Sarkar, and Matthew Sobek. 2011. "The North Atlantic Population Project: Progress and Prospects." Historical Methods 44: 1-6.

Petra Noble, David Van Riper, Steven Ruggles, Jonathan Schroeder, and Monty Hindman. 2011. "Harmonizing Data across Time and Place: The Integrated Spatio-Temporal Aggregate Data Series." Historical Methods 44: 79-85.

Steven Ruggles. 2010. "Stem Families and Joint Families in Comparative Historical Perspective." Population and Development Review 35: 249-273. PMCID: PMC3057610.

Robert McCaa, Steven Ruggles, and Matthew Sobek. 2010. "IPUMS-International Statistical Disclosure Controls." In Josep Domingo-Ferrer and Emmanouil Magkos, eds., Privacy in Statistical Databases. Berlin and Heidelberg: Springer Verlag, pp. 74-84.

Steven Ruggles. 2009. "Reconsidering the Northwest European Family System." Population and Development Review 35: 249-273. PMCID: PMC2917824

Michael Davern, Steven Ruggles, Tami Swenson, Michael Oakes, and Trent Alexander. 2009. "Drawing Statistical Inferences from Historical Census Data" Demography 46: 589-603. PMCID: PMC2831349

Steven Ruggles and Misty Heggeness. 2008. "Intergenerational Families in Developing Countries." Population and Development Review 34: 253-281.

Steven Ruggles. 2007. "The research5line of Intergenerational Coresidence in the United States, 1850-2000."American Sociological Review. 72: 962-989.

Steven Ruggles. 2006. "Linking Historical Censuses: A New Approach." History and Computing 14: 213-224.

Steven Ruggles2005. "The Minnesota Population Center Data Integration Projects: Challenges of harmonizing census microdata across time and place" 2005 Proceedings of the American Statistical Association, Government Statistics Section, Alexandria, VA: American Statistical Association, pp. 1405-1415.

Catherine Fitch, Ron Goeken and Steven Ruggles. 2005. "The Rise of Cohabitation in the United States: New Historical Estimates." Minnesota Population Center Working Paper.

Patricia Kelly Hall and Steven Ruggles. 2004. "'Restless in the Midst of their Prosperity': New Evidence of the Internal Migration Patterns  of Americans, 1850-1990." Journal of American History 91: 829-846.

Steven Ruggles. 2003. "Multigenerational families in nineteenth-century America." Continuity and Change 18: 139-165.

Steven Ruggles and Susan Brower. 2003. "The Measurement of Family and Household Composition in the United States, 1850-1999." Population and Development Review 29: 73-101.

Steven Ruggles. 2003. "The Measurement of Family and Household Composition in Census 2000: An Update." Population and Development Review 29: 480-482.

Steven Ruggles et al. 2003. Building Historical Data Infrastructure: New Projects of the Minnesota Population Center. Two Special issues, Historical Methods, 36:1 (Winter 2003) and 36:2 (Summer 2003). Introduction, Redesign, International, NAPP, NHGIS, 1880 Project

Steven Ruggles. 2001. Living Arrangements and Economic Well-being of the Aged in the Past." Population Bulletin of the United Nations. 42/43: 111-61.

Catherine Fitch and Steven Ruggles. 2000. Historical Trends in Marriage Formation." In Linda Waite, Christine Bachrach, Michelle Hindin, Elizabeth Thomson, and Arland Thornton, eds., Ties that Bind: Perspectives on Marriage and Cohabitation. Hawthorne: Aldine de Gruyter, pp. 59-88.

Task Force on Census. 2000. The Public Use Microdata Samples of the U.S. Census: Research Applications and Privacy Issues. Prepared by Steven Ruggles with Catherine A. Fitch and Matthew Sobek. Minneapolis: Minnesota Population Center.

Steven Ruggles. 1999. "The Limitations of English Family Reconstitution." Continuity and Change 14: 105-130.

Steven Ruggles. 1997. "The Rise of Divorce and Separation in the United States, 1880-1990." Demography 34: 455-466.

Steven Ruggles. 1997. "Reply to Oppenheimer and Preston." Demography 34: 475-479.

Steven Ruggles. 1996 "The Effects of Demographic Change on Multigenerational Family Structure: United States Whites 1880-1980"  In Alain Bideau, A. Perrenoud, K.A. Lynch and G. Brunet, eds., Les systemes demographiques du passe. Lyons: Centre Jacques Cartier, pp. 21-40.

Steven Ruggles. 1994. "The Transformation of American Family Structure." American Historical Review 99: 103-128.

Steven Ruggles. 1994. "The Origins of African-American Family Structure." American Sociological Review 59: 136-151.

Steven Ruggles. 1993. "Confessions of a Microsimulator: Problems in Modeling the Demography of Kinship." Historical Methods 26: 161-169.

Steven Ruggles. 1992. "Migration, Marriage, and Mortality: Correcting Sources of Bias in English Family Reconstitutions." Population Studies 46: 507-522.

Steven Ruggles and Ron Goeken. 1992. "Race and Multigenerational Family Structure, 1900- 1980.." In Scott J. South and Stuart E. Tolnay, eds., The Changing American Family: Sociological and Demographic Perspectives Boulder: Westview Press, pp. 15-42.

Steven Ruggles. 1991. "The U.S. Public Use Microdata Files as a Source for the Study of Long Term Social Change." IASSIST Quarterly 15: 20-27.

Steven Ruggles. 1991. "Comparability of the Public Use Files of the U.S. Census of Population, 1880-1980." Social Science History 15: 123-158.

Steven Ruggles. 1991. "Integration of the Public Use Samples of the U.S. Census." 1991 Proceedings of the American Statistical Association Social Statistics Section. Alexandria, VA: American Statistical Association, pp. 365-370.

Miriam King and Steven Ruggles. 1990. "American Immigration, Fertility Differentials, and the Ideology of Race Suicide at the Turn of the Century." Journal of Interdisciplinary History 20: 347-369.

Steven Ruggles. 1988. "The Demography of the Unrelated Individual 1900-1950." Demography 25: 521-536.

Steven Ruggles. 1986. "Availability of Kin and the Demography of Historical Family Structure.." Historical Methods 19: 93-102.

Steven Ruggles. 1983. "Fallen Women: The Inmates of the Magdalen Society Asylum of Philadelphia 1836-1908." Journal of Social History 16: 65-82.