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The context of the discussion is the increasing incidence of international surveys, of which one is the International Tobacco Control (ITC) Policy Evaluation Project, which began in 2002. The ITC country surveys are longitudinal, and their aim is to evaluate the effects of policy measures being introduced in various countries under the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. The challenges of organization, data collection and analysis in international surveys are reviewed and illustrated. Analysis is an increasingly important part of the motivation for large scale cross-cultural surveys. The fundamental challenge for analysis is to discern the real response (or lack of response) to policy change, separating it from the effects of data collection mode, differential non-response, external events, time-in-sample, culture, and language. Two problems relevant to statistical analysis are discussed. The first problem is the question of when and how to analyze pooled data from several countries, in order to strengthen conclusions which might be generally valid. While in some cases this seems to be straightforward, there are differing opinions on the extent to which pooling is possible and reasonable. It is suggested that for formal comparisons, random effects models are of conceptual use. The second problem is to find models of measurement across cultures and data collection modes which will enable calibration of continuous, binary and ordinal responses, and produce comparisons from which extraneous effects have been removed. It is noted that hierarchical models provide a natural way of relaxing requirements of model invariance across groups.

Dependent interviewing (DI) is used in many longitudinal surveys to "feed forward" data from one wave to the next. Though it is a promising technique which has been demonstrated to enhance data quality in certain respects, relatively little is known about how it is actually administered in the field. This research seeks to address this issue through behavior coding. Various styles of DI were employed in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) in January, 2006, and recordings were made of pilot field interviews. These recordings were analysed to determine whether the questions (particularly the DI aspects) were administered appropriately and to explore the respondent's reaction to the fed-forward data. Of particular interest was whether respondents confirmed or challenged the previously-reported information, whether the prior wave data came into play when respondents were providing their current-wave answers, and how any discrepancies were negotiated by the interviewer and respondent. Also of interest was to examine the effectiveness of various styles of DI. For example, in some cases the prior wave data was brought forward and respondents were asked to explicitly confirm it; in other cases the previous data was read and respondents were asked if the situation was still the same. Results indicate varying levels of compliance in terms of initial question-reading, and suggest that some styles of DI may be more effective than others.

In longitudinal surveys nonresponse often occurs in a pattern that is not monotone. We consider estimation of time-dependent means under the assumption that the nonresponse mechanism is last-value-dependent. Since the last value itself may be missing when nonresponse is nonmonotone, the nonresponse mechanism under consideration is nonignorable. We propose an imputation method by first deriving some regression imputation models according to the nonresponse mechanism and then applying nonparametric regression imputation. We assume that the longitudinal data follow a Markov chain with finite second-order moments. No other assumption is imposed on the joint distribution of longitudinal data and their nonresponse indicators. A bootstrap method is applied for variance estimation. Some simulation results and an example concerning the Current Employment Survey are presented.

Sample weights can be calibrated to reflect the known population totals of a set of auxiliary variables. Predictors of finite population totals calculated using these weights have low bias if these variables are related to the variable of interest, but can have high variance if too many auxiliary variables are used. This article develops an "adaptive calibration" approach, where the auxiliary variables to be used in weighting are selected using sample data. Adaptively calibrated estimators are shown to have lower mean squared error and better coverage properties than non-adaptive estimators in many cases.

We propose a method for estimating the variance of estimators of changes over time, a method that takes account of all the components of these estimators: the sampling design, treatment of non-response, treatment of large companies, correlation of non-response from one wave to another, the effect of using a panel, robustification, and calibration using a ratio estimator. This method, which serves to determine the confidence intervals of changes over time, is then applied to the Swiss survey of value added.

The analysis of stratified multistage sample data requires the use of design information such as stratum and primary sampling unit (PSU) identifiers, or associated replicate weights, in variance estimation. In some public release data files, such design information is masked as an effort to avoid their disclosure risk and yet to allow the user to obtain valid variance estimation. For example, in area surveys with a limited number of PSUs, the original PSUs are split or/and recombined to construct pseudo-PSUs with swapped second or subsequent stage sampling units. Such PSU masking methods, however, obviously distort the clustering structure of the sample design, yielding biased variance estimates possibly with certain systematic patterns between two variance estimates from the unmasked and masked PSU identifiers. Some of the previous work observed patterns in the ratio of the masked and unmasked variance estimates when plotted against the unmasked design effect. This paper investigates the effect of PSU masking on variance estimates under cluster sampling regarding various aspects including the clustering structure and the degree of masking. Also, we seek a PSU masking strategy through swapping of subsequent stage sampling units that helps reduce the resulting biases of the variance estimates. For illustration, we used data from the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) with some artificial modification. The proposed strategy performs very well in reducing the biases of variance estimates. Both theory and empirical results indicate that the effect of PSU masking on variance estimates is modest with minimal swapping of subsequent stage sampling units. The proposed masking strategy has been applied to the 2003-2004 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) data release.

The design of a stratified simple random sample without replacement from a finite population deals with two main issues: the definition of a rule to partition the population into strata, and the allocation of sampling units in the selected strata. This article examines a tree-based strategy which plans to approach jointly these issues when the survey is multipurpose and multivariate information, quantitative or qualitative, is available. Strata are formed through a hierarchical divisive algorithm that selects finer and finer partitions by minimizing, at each step, the sample allocation required to achieve the precision levels set for each surveyed variable. In this way, large numbers of constraints can be satisfied without drastically increasing the sample size, and also without discarding variables selected for stratification or diminishing the number of their class intervals. Furthermore, the algorithm tends not to define empty or almost empty strata, thus avoiding the need for strata collapsing aggregations. The procedure was applied to redesign the Italian Farm Structure Survey. The results indicate that the gain in efficiency held using our strategy is nontrivial. For a given sample size, this procedure achieves the required precision by exploiting a number of strata which is usually a very small fraction of the number of strata available when combining all possible classes from any of the covariates.

Optimum stratification is the method of choosing the best boundaries that make strata internally homogeneous, given some sample allocation. In order to make the strata internally homogenous, the strata should be constructed in such a way that the strata variances for the characteristic under study be as small as possible. This could be achieved effectively by having the distribution of the main study variable known and create strata by cutting the range of the distribution at suitable points. If the frequency distribution of the study variable is unknown, it may be approximated from the past experience or some prior knowledge obtained at a recent study. In this paper the problem of finding Optimum Strata Boundaries (OSB) is considered as the problem of determining Optimum Strata Widths (OSW). The problem is formulated as a Mathematical Programming Problem (MPP), which minimizes the variance of the estimated population parameter under Neyman allocation subject to the restriction that sum of the widths of all the strata is equal to the total range of the distribution. The distributions of the study variable are considered as continuous with Triangular and Standard Normal density functions. The formulated MPPs, which turn out to be multistage decision problems, can then be solved using dynamic programming technique proposed by Bühler and Deutler (1975). Numerical examples are presented to illustrate the computational details. The results obtained are also compared with the method of Dalenius and Hodges (1959) with an example of normal distribution.

This paper considers the optimum allocation in multivariate stratified sampling as a nonlinear matrix optimisation of integers. As a particular case, a nonlinear problem of the multi-objective optimisation of integers is studied. A full detailed example including some of proposed techniques is provided at the end of the work.

The present work illustrates a sampling strategy useful for obtaining planned sample size for domains belonging to different partitions of the population and in order to guarantee the sampling errors of domain estimates be lower than given thresholds. The sampling strategy that covers the multivariate multi-domain case is useful when the overall sample size is bounded and consequently the standard solution of using a stratified sample with the strata given by cross-classification of variables defining the different partitions is not feasible since the number of strata is larger than the overall sample size. The proposed sampling strategy is based on the use of balanced sampling selection technique and on a GREG-type estimation. The main advantages of the solution is the computational feasibility which allows one to easily implement an overall small area strategy considering jointly the sampling design and the estimator and improving the efficiency of the direct domain estimators. An empirical simulation on real population data and different domain estimators shows the empirical properties of the examined sample strategy.

This publication presents quarterly information on Canada's National Income and Expenditure Accounts (NIEA), 1947-2008. It contains data on gross domestic product (GDP) by income and by expenditure, saving and investment, borrowing and lending of each of four broad sectors of the economy: (i) persons and unincorporated businesses, (ii) corporate and government business enterprises, (iii) governments and (iv) non-residents. Information is also provided for selected subsectors. The publication begins with an analysis of the economic developments in the most recent quarter. Some issues also contain more technical articles explaining national accounts methodology or analysing a particular aspect of the economy. The publication also includes a glossary, and is no longer being released.

This publication presents early estimates of mineral production by class and by province, quantities and values.

A series of supporting data tables accompanies the Inuit analytical article from the 2006 Aboriginal Peoples Survey (APS). These tables provide data at the national level, for each of the four Inuit regions (Nunatsiavut, Nunavik, Nunavut and the Inuvialuit region), along with data for Inuit outside these regions for major themes covered in the analytical article. Data for the Inuit identity population aged 15 and over are provided for: Participation in harvesting activities; diagnosed with arthritis/rheumatism, high blood pressure, asthma, stomach problems or intestinal ulcers, heart problems, tuberculosis and diabetes; smoking status; self-rated health status and; reasons for not completing elementary or secondary school. For Inuit children aged 6 to 14, tables include: contact with a pediatrician, general practitioner or family physician in past 12 months; contact with another medical specialist and; food insecurity.

Data for Canada, provinces, territories, census divisions, census subdivisions and dissemination areas are shown in this table.

This table is part of the topic 'Labour', which presents data on the paid work of the Canadian workforce, including detailed industry and occupation data, class of worker, and work activity during the reference year. The census is the only source of data covering the entire labour market, including Indian reserves, overseas households, and all provinces and territories.

This topic also presents data on the unpaid work of the Canadian workforce, including unpaid household work, unpaid child care, and unpaid senior care. These data, together with information on paid work, provide a more complete picture of the work activities of all Canadians.

It is possible to subscribe to all the day-of-release topic bundles. Refer to Catalogue no. 97-569-XCB for more information.

Data for Canada, provinces, territories, census divisions, census subdivisions and dissemination areas are shown in this table.

This table is part of the topic 'Income and earnings,' which presents data on the income of Canadian individuals, families, and households in the year 2005, including the composition of income, and data that serve to measure low income, known as the low income cut-off (LICO). The data also include the household incomes of Canadians by family type, age, and geography, as well as the household incomes of certain population groups (e.g., immigrants).

The composition of income includes earnings, income from government sources, and investments.

It is possible to subscribe to all the day-of-release bundles. Refer to Catalogue no. 97-569-XCB for more information.

The tables in the topic 'Labour' present data on the paid work of the Canadian workforce, including detailed industry and occupation data, class of worker, and work activity during the reference year. The census is the only source of data covering the entire labour market, including Indian reserves, overseas households, and all provinces and territories.

This topic also presents data on the unpaid work of the Canadian workforce, including unpaid household work, unpaid child care, and unpaid senior care. These data, together with information on paid work, provide a more complete picture of the work activities of all Canadians.

The tables in the topic "Income and earnings" present data on the income of Canadian individuals, families, and households in the year 2005, including the composition of income, and data that serve to measure low income, known as the low income cut-off (LICO). The data also include the household incomes of Canadians by family type, age, and geography, as well as the household incomes of certain population groups (e.g., immigrants).

The composition of income includes earnings, income from government sources, and investments.

This article profiles manure production in Canada and maps manure production by sub-sub-drainage area for 2006.

Data for Canada, provinces and territories are shown in this table.

This table is part of the topic 'Income and earnings,' which presents data on the income of Canadian individuals, families, and households in the year 2005, including the composition of income, and data that serve to measure low income, known as the low income cut-off (LICO). The data also include the household incomes of Canadians by family type, age, and geography, as well as the household incomes of certain population groups (e.g., immigrants).

The composition of income includes earnings, income from government sources, and investments.

It is possible to subscribe to all the day-of-release bundles. Refer to Catalogue no. 97-569-XCB for more information.

This table is available free on the Internet, Catalogue no. 97-563-XWE2006008.

Data for Canada, provinces and territories are shown in this table.

This table is part of the topic 'Income and earnings,' which presents data on the income of Canadian individuals, families, and households in the year 2005, including the composition of income, and data that serve to measure low income, known as the low income cut-off (LICO). The data also include the household incomes of Canadians by family type, age, and geography, as well as the household incomes of certain population groups (e.g., immigrants).

The composition of income includes earnings, income from government sources, and investments.

It is possible to subscribe to all the day-of-release bundles. Refer to Catalogue no. 97-569-XCB for more information.

This table is available free on the Internet, Catalogue no. 97-563-XWE2006009.

This paper considers situations where the target response value is either zero or an observation from a continuous distribution. A typical example analyzed in the paper is the assessment of literacy proficiency with the possible outcome being either zero, indicating illiteracy, or a positive score measuring the level of literacy. Our interest is in how to obtain valid estimates of the average response, or the proportion of positive responses in small areas, for which only small samples or no samples are available. As in other small area estimation problems, the small sample sizes in at least some of the sampled areas and/or the existence of nonsampled areas requires the use of model based methods. Available methods, however, are not suitable for this kind of data because of the mixed distribution of the responses, having a large peak at zero, juxtaposed to a continuous distribution for the rest of the responses. We develop, therefore, a suitable two-part random effects model and show how to fit the model and assess its goodness of fit, and how to compute the small area estimators of interest and measure their precision. The proposed method is illustrated using simulated data and data obtained from a literacy survey conducted in Cambodia.

In this Issue is a column where the Editor biefly presents each paper of the current issue of Survey Methodology. As well, it sometimes contain informations on structure or management changes in the journal.

Many historical comparisons of international productivity use measures of labour productivity (output per worker). Differences in labour productivity can be caused by differences in technical efficiency or differences in capital intensity. Moving to measures of total factor productivity allows international comparisons to ascertain whether differences in labour productivity arise from differences in efficiency or differences in factors utilized in the production process.

This paper examines differences in output per worker in the manufacturing sectors of Canada and the United States in 1929 and the extent to which it arises from efficiency differences. It makes corrections for differences in capital and materials intensity per worker in order to derive a measure of total factor efficiency of Canada relative to the United States, using detailed industry data. It finds that while output per worker in Canada was only about 75% of the United States productivity level, the total factor productivity measure of Canada was about the same as the United States level - that is, there was very little difference in technical efficiency in the two countries. Canada's lower output per worker was the result of the use of less capital and materials per worker than the United States.

This is one of three fact sheets in the series using information from the 2006 Aboriginal Peoples Survey (APS) and 2006 Census. The purpose of this fact sheet is to provide information on the topics of access to health professionals, chronic conditions, smoking rates, dental care, barriers to school completion, food insecurity, harvesting country food and country food consumption and sharing. Results are presented for Inuit children aged six to 14 and Inuit aged 15 and over. Findings are for Inuit at the national level, for those in each of the four Inuit regions (Nunatsiavut, Nunavik, Nunavut and the Inuvialuit region) and in some cases, for those outside the Inuit regions.

In 2007, the proportion of employed people in Canada was at its highest level in at least three decades, while the national unemployment rate sank to a 33-year low of 5.8%. However, manufacturing employment in Canada, as in the United States, has been on a downward trend. Between 2002 and 2007 employment rates increased the most in the highest-paying industries and occupations. On the other hand, some job losses were experienced by machine operators and assembly workers. Retail trade had been the largest creator of new jobs but was surpassed in 2007 by construction, and health care and social assistance.

Education and training continue to be important in the labour market. To many, this implies a university degree. But society also needs tradesworkers to perform many vital tasks -- build houses, run the electrical lines, fix plumbing and maintain cars to name just a few. Many businesses are reporting difficulties finding skilled tradespersons and governments are responding with policies to stimulate employment in the trades. Employment trends in selected trades over the past 20 years are examined, along with the socio-economic traits of the workers and the characteristics of their jobs.

Interprovincial migration is a key component of demographic change in Canada. It also influences the supply of public services and tax revenues, the performance and efficiency of labour markets and productivity. As one would expect, people generally move from provinces with slack local labour markets to provinces with stronger labour markets. Improvements in labour market conditions and labour market outcomes tend to reduce out-migration rates. Migrants also record better earnings growth than non-migrants, especially when they are young.

Retirement is a process rather than a discrete event. Many older workers who start receiving a pension stay in the labour market in some capacity for roughly two to three years before they completely cease employment. And many who quit paid work at one point subsequently return to the labour market, especially in the first year after leaving their career job. For a substantial proportion of older workers, this 'bridge employment appears to be a choice rather than a necessity.

Commuting is, to a large extent, an urban phenomenon. Close to 80% of commuting takes place between municipalities within larger urban centres. But commuting patterns are becoming increasingly complex and rural commuting is more complex than commonly believed. For persons in rural and small-town areas, rural-to-rural commuting is as large as rural-to-urban commuting. Moreover, rural jobs are more than twice as reliant on in-commuting rural workers as they are on in-commuting urban workers.

This paper examines the variability of workers' earnings in Canada over the 1982-to-2000 period by a graphical descriptive approach using the Longitudinal Administrative Data base file. Following Gottschalk and Moffitt (1994), we decompose the total variance of workers' earnings into a 'permanent' or long-run component between workers and a 'transitory' or year-to-year earnings instability component over time for given workers. The decomposition is applied to a five-year moving window. Several results are found. First, the general rise in total earnings variance over the period reflects quite different patterns of change for its separate components. Long-run earnings inequality has generally increased over the period, while year-to-year earnings instability has pretty steadily decreased. Changes in the total earnings variability have been driven primarily by changes in long-run earnings inequality. Second, the patterns of change in the two variance components showed substantial differences between men and women. Since the early 1990s, long-run earnings inequality continued to rise for men, but it markedly decreased for women. Since the late 1980s, earnings instability fell quite steadily for women, but it showed a more cyclical pattern for men. Third, the patterns across ages of the two variance components are almost opposite. Long-run earnings inequality generally rises with age, so it is markedly highest among older-age workers. Earnings instability, in contrast, generally declines with age, so it is markedly highest among entry-age workers.

This guide presents information of interest to users of data from the Survey of Household Spending, which gathers information on the spending habits, dwelling characteristics and household equipment of Canadian households. The survey covers private households in the 10 provinces. (The territories are surveyed every second year, starting in 1999.)

This guide includes definitions of survey terms and variables, as well as descriptions of survey methodology and data quality. One section describes the various statistics that can be created using expenditure data (e.g., budget share, market share, aggregates and medians)

This guide focuses on the following variables: After-tax income, Total income and its components, Income status as well as other related variables from the Income and earnings release.

Provides information that enables users to effectively use, apply and interpret data from the 2006 Census. Each guide contains definitions and explanations on census concepts, data quality and historical comparability. Additional information will be included for specific variables to help general users better understand the concepts and questions used in the census.

This guide focuses on the following variables: After-tax income, Total income and its components, Income status as well as other related variables from the Income and earnings release.

Provides information that enables users to effectively use, apply and interpret data from the 2006 Census. Each guide contains definitions and explanations on census concepts, data quality and historical comparability. Additional information will be included for specific variables to help general users better understand the concepts and questions used in the census.

This guide is intended to help data users understand the concepts and methods used in the 2006 Aboriginal Children's Survey (ACS), which was conducted from October 2006 to March 2007.

Technical details on sampling, processing and data quality are included in this guide. Further, the guide explains the relationship between the ACS and the 2006 Census and cautions users as to important differences in the data produced from these two sources. Appendix 1 contains a glossary of terms that relate to the ACS. Answers to some frequently asked questions are provided in Appendix 2. Links to the 2006 ACS questionnaires are found in Appendix 3.

This kit provides teachers with innovative classroom materials that make use of the results of the 2006 Census. Activities are available for intermediate and secondary schools, are classroom-ready, and have been classroom-tested by professional educators. Minimal preparation time is required.

Activities are grouped according to subject, using census terminology.

The 2006 Census Teacher's Kit activities are appropriate for the following subjects: English, Mathematics, Social Sciences, Geography, History, Family Studies and Informatics. Suggested grade levels are indicated on each activity and all necessary tables, charts, graphs and data are included.

With each census, Statistics Canada improves its methods of dissemination to the public by seeking ways of publishing census results in a timely and accessible manner, while maintaining high data quality standards.

This consultation guide has been developed to assist you in providing feedback on 2006 Census products and services and in contributing ideas and suggestions to the 2011 Census dissemination strategy.

Starting in 1994, the Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics (SLID) will follow individuals and families for at least six years, tracking their labour market experiences, changes in income and family circumstances. An initial proposal for the content of SLID, entitled Content of the Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics : Discussion Paper, was distributed in February 1992.

That paper served as a background document for consultation wit h interested users. The content underwent significant change during this process. Based upon the revised content, a large-scale test of SLID will be conducted in February and May 1993.

This document outlines the current demographic and labour content, leading into the test.

This free publication presents the concepts and criteria utilized to determine the entities that comprise the public sector of Canada.

The resulting statistical universe provides the framework to observe the extent of governments' involvement in the production of goods and services and the associated resource allocation process in the Canadian economy.

The concepts and criteria contained in the guide are consistent with two internationally accepted classification standards: the System of National Accounts (SNA 2008) guide; and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Government Finance Statistics Manual 2001.

As well, the guide delineates the various public sector components that are used in compiling and aggregating public sector data. This structure also enables comparisons of Canadian government finance data with international macroeconomic statistical systems.

This special methodological paper will help readers understand and assess reports that rank the health status or health system performance of a country, province or jurisdiction. The report outlines the components and processes that underlie health rankings, explores why such rankings can be difficult to interpret and includes a plain-language checklist to use as a critical evaluative resource when reading health-ranking reports.

This book provides technical documentation of variables, methodologies and extended lists of references used in developing the research findings reported in "New Frontiers of Research on Retirement". It will be used around the world by researchers and teachers, as well as by students preparing theses related to patterns of transition to retirement. This documentation is important because a large part of book is devoted to scientific papers that are based upon Statistics Canada's data and which require substantial innovations of useful concepts and data.