Canada's General Social Survey on Time Use: Challenges and Potential - ARCHIVED

The General Social Survey (GSS) is an annual survey that monitors changes and emerging trends in Canadian Society. For the fourth time in Canada, the GSS has collected national level time use data. The GSS is funded through a government initiative aimed to fill data gaps for policy research. In this paper we present the policy framework that supports the survey, and discuss the impact of that framework on the content decisions that GSS has made. Following a brief review of the major findings from the first three cycles of time use data we discuss the lessons learned and best practices in the development, collection and processing of these data in Canada. Finally, we compare the methods and content of the Canadian time use survey with the US survey.