Comparing Open-Source Record Linkage Software to Existing Approaches: A Case Study using Census Data

The U.S. Census Bureau has used entity resolution, also referred to as record linkage ordeduplication, for the decennial censuses and other programs such as post-enumeration surveys forseveral decades. In particular, entity resolution was used on names and common characteristics inthe 2020 Censusto deduplicate censusresponses and to link people rostered in the Post-EnumerationSurvey (PES) to people enumerated in the Census. In preparation for the 2030 Census, the DecennialCensus research agenda includes assessing different record linkage methodology and software. Thispaper discusses and compares BigMatch, which is a matching software developed at the CensusBureau, against two recent options of open-source software, fastLink and Splink. This paperprovides results such as metrics of accuracy measured against 2020 PES clerically reviewed data,for each software.