1 / 15

Katherine R. Smith, Executive Director Council of Professional Associations on Federal Statistics

(In)Consistency of Economic Data across Federal Statistical Agencies: What Information Professionals Can Do September 29, 2014. Katherine R. Smith, Executive Director Council of Professional Associations on Federal Statistics. Federal Statistical System.

elaine-skinner
Download Presentation

Katherine R. Smith, Executive Director Council of Professional Associations on Federal Statistics

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. (In)Consistency of Economic Data across Federal Statistical Agencies: What Information Professionals Can DoSeptember 29, 2014 Katherine R. Smith, Executive Director Council of Professional Associations on Federal Statistics

  2. Federal Statistical System • About 100 federal agencies collect data • Thirteen designated (by OMB) as official statistical agencies • Bureau of Labor Statistics, Census, and Bureau of Economic Analysis produce economic statistics • But so do dozens of others • There are also administrative data on economic phenomena

  3. Federal Statistical System Decentralized SMOKESTACKED INTERDEPENDENT

  4. Search Income onCensus Site • Annual Social and Economic Supplement to the Current Population Survey (CPS ASEC) • American Community Survey (ACS) • Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) • Census 2000 long form • Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates Program (SAIPE)

  5. Other Federal Statistics on Income • Internal Revenue Service • Farm Household Income (USDA, Economic Research Service) • Bureau of Economic Analysis Personal Income DATA.GOV 1,853 datasets found for "Income"

  6. How Wealthy are Americans? • Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) • Federal Reserve Board Survey of Consumer Finance • Federal Reserve Board Flow of Funds Data • Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) • Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) • Internal revenue Service (IRS) • Economic Research Service farm household wealth

  7. Differences in Other MeasuresSome Notable Examples • Health insurance coverage • Census, NCHS, AHQR • Crime Statistics • FBI, BJS • Immigration • OIS and Census

  8. Differences in Business Classification • 30% of U.S. establishments are classified as belonging to different industries by BLS and Census • Census uses IRS tax filing data to develop its establishment list. BLS has access to neither IRS lists, nor the Census list developed with IRS input.

  9. Differences Are Not Surprising • The phenomena measured or data collected are for different purposes, in different contexts • Coverage, Time Dimension, Collection Methods differ • Differences in data treatment or statistical models used. • Revisions and Differential Discontinuities

  10. Why Do We Care? • IT’S CONFUSING! • May generate suspicion that only one estimate is right or lower confidence in the statistical system • Allocations are based on some measures with multiple measures • Comparability suffers

  11. What can agencies do ? • Pick one “official” estimate • Concurrent releases of data • Attempt to standardize definitions • Across the statistical system • One agency at a time • Do a better job of explaining how measures vary, and why

  12. Bureau of Labor Statistics Taxonomy/Lexicon Initiative Mission Develop a BLS-wide, consistent taxonomy (hierarchy of categories or concepts) and lexicon (word list with synonyms) of BLS concepts in plain English geared towards the lay public, to be used in data query tools, document tagging, website search and navigation, and records management.

  13. What’s an Information Specialist to do? ASK Record Explain

  14. Thank You! Katherine Smith kitty.smith@copafs.org 703-836-0404 Visit us on Twitter @COPAFS

More Related