Analysis

Description:

Postsecondary students finance their education in a variety of ways, including employment income, savings, family support, scholarships, and loans from government and private sources. This Canadian Social Trends article discusses student loans: not the most frequently used form of financial support for students, but an important source for those who do borrow.

Description:

This multivariate statistical analysis, which captures the number of prior police contacts of young people apprehended by the police, uses longitudinally linked records from the Incident-Based Uniform Crime Reporting Survey for 1995 to 2001.

Description:

Linearization (or Taylor series) methods are widely used to estimate standard errors for the co-efficients of linear regression models fit to multi-stage samples. When the number of primary sampling units (PSUs) is large, linearization can produce accurate standard errors under quite general conditions. However, when the number of PSUs is small or a co-efficient depends primarily on data from a small number of PSUs, linearization estimators can have large negative bias.

In this paper, we characterize features of the design matrix that produce large bias in linearization standard errors for linear regression co-efficients. We then propose a new method, bias reduced linearization (BRL), based on residuals adjusted to better approximate the covariance of the true errors. When the errors are independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.), the BRL estimator is unbiased for the variance. Furthermore, a simulation study shows that BRL can greatly reduce the bias, even if the errors are not i.i.d. We also propose using a Satterthwaite approximation to determine the degrees of freedom of the reference distribution for tests and confidence intervals about linear combinations of co-efficients based on the BRL estimator. We demonstrate that the jackknife estimator also tends to be biased in situations where linearization is biased. However, the jackknife's bias tends to be positive. Our bias-reduced linearization estimator can be viewed as a compromise between the traditional linearization and jackknife estimators.

Description:

In this paper, we discuss the analysis of complex health survey data by using multivariate modelling techniques. Main interests are in various design-based and model-based methods that aim at accounting for the design complexities, including clustering, stratification and weighting. Methods covered include generalized linear modelling based on pseudo-likelihood and generalized estimating equations, linear mixed models estimated by restricted maximum likelihood, and hierarchical Bayes techniques using Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods. The methods will be compared empirically, using data from an extensive health interview and examination survey conducted in Finland in 2000 (Health 2000 Study).

The data of the Health 2000 Study were collected using personal interviews, questionnaires and clinical examinations. A stratified two-stage cluster sampling design was used in the survey. The sampling design involved positive intra-cluster correlation for many study variables. For a closer investigation, we selected a small number of study variables from the health interview and health examination phases. In many cases, the different methods produced similar numerical results and supported similar statistical conclusions. Methods that failed to account for the design complexities sometimes led to conflicting conclusions. We also discuss the application of the methods in this paper by using standard statistical software products.

Description:

In this paper, we consider the effect of the interval censoring of cessation time on intensity parameter estimation with regard to smoking cessation and pregnancy. The three waves of the National Population Health Survey allow the methodology of event history analysis to be applied to smoking initiation, cessation and relapse. One issue of interest is the relationship between smoking cessation and pregnancy. If a longitudinal respondent who is a smoker at the first cycle ceases smoking by the second cycle, we know the cessation time to within an interval of length at most a year, since the respondent is asked for the age at which she stopped smoking, and her date of birth is known. We also know whether she is pregnant at the time of the second cycle, and whether she has given birth since the time of the first cycle. For many such subjects, we know the date of conception to within a relatively small interval. If we knew the time of smoking cessation and pregnancy period exactly for each member who experienced one or other of these events between cycles, we could model their temporal relationship through their joint intensities.

Description:

This paper explores the relationship between low income and prevalence of asthma. The genetic and environmental determinants are incompletely understood. It has been observed in a previous study that Canadians with low incomes are at increased risk of asthma. Based on data from 17,605 subjects 12 years of age or older who participated in the first cycle of the National Population Health Survey (NPHS) from 1994 to 1995, males and females with low incomes had 1.44- and 1.33-fold increases, respectively, in the prevalence of asthma compared with their counterparts with high incomes. However, there was no significant difference observed between middle and high income categories. Therefore, it is not clear if there is a more systematic relationship between income adequacy and asthma occurrence. A much larger sample size of the second cycle of the NPHS allowed us to further explore if the prevalence of asthma increases with decreasing income adequacy among Canadians.

Description:

In this highly technical paper, we illustrate the application of the delete-a-group jack-knife variance estimator approach to a particular complex multi-wave longitudinal study, demonstrating its utility for linear regression and other analytic models. The delete-a-group jack-knife variance estimator is proving a very useful tool for measuring variances under complex sampling designs. This technique divides the first-phase sample into mutually exclusive and nearly equal variance groups, deletes one group at a time to create a set of replicates and makes analogous weighting adjustments in each replicate to those done for the sample as a whole. Variance estimation proceeds in the standard (unstratified) jack-knife fashion.

Our application is to the Chicago Health and Aging Project (CHAP), a community-based longitudinal study examining risk factors for chronic health problems of older adults. A major aim of the study is the investigation of risk factors for incident Alzheimer's disease. The current design of CHAP has two components: (1) Every three years, all surviving members of the cohort are interviewed on a variety of health-related topics. These interviews include cognitive and physical function measures. (2) At each of these waves of data collection, a stratified Poisson sample is drawn from among the respondents to the full population interview for detailed clinical evaluation and neuropsychological testing. To investigate risk factors for incident disease, a 'disease-free' cohort is identified at the preceding time point and forms one major stratum in the sampling frame.

We provide proofs of the theoretical applicability of the delete-a-group jack-knife for particular estimators under this Poisson design, paying needed attention to the distinction between finite-population and infinite-population (model) inference. In addition, we examine the issue of determining the 'right number' of variance groups.

Description:

This paper will describe the multiple imputation of income in the National Health Interview Survey and discuss the methodological issues involved. In addition, the paper will present empirical summaries of the imputations as well as results of a Monte Carlo evaluation of inferences based on multiply imputed income items.

Analysts of health data are often interested in studying relationships between income and health. The National Health Interview Survey, conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, provides a rich source of data for studying such relationships. However, the nonresponse rates on two key income items, an individual's earned income and a family's total income, are over 20%. Moreover, these nonresponse rates appear to be increasing over time. A project is currently underway to multiply impute individual earnings and family income along with some other covariates for the National Health Interview Survey in 1997 and subsequent years.

There are many challenges in developing appropriate multiple imputations for such large-scale surveys. First, there are many variables of different types, with different skip patterns and logical relationships. Second, it is not known what types of associations will be investigated by the analysts of multiply imputed data. Finally, some variables, such as family income, are collected at the family level and others, such as earned income, are collected at the individual level. To make the imputations for both the family- and individual-level variables conditional on as many predictors as possible, and to simplify modelling, we are using a modified version of the sequential regression imputation method described in Raghunathan et al. ( Survey Methodology, 2001).

Besides issues related to the hierarchical nature of the imputations just described, there are other methodological issues of interest such as the use of transformations of the income variables, the imposition of restrictions on the values of variables, the general validity of sequential regression imputation and, even more generally, the validity of multiple-imputation inferences for surveys with complex sample designs.

Description:

Missing data are a constant problem in large-scale surveys. Such incompleteness is usually dealt with either by restricting the analysis to the cases with complete records or by imputing, for each missing item, an efficiently estimated value. The deficiencies of these approaches will be discussed in this paper, especially in the context of estimating a large number of quantities. The main part of the paper will describe two examples of analyses using multiple imputation.

In the first, the International Labour Organization (ILO) employment status is imputed in the British Labour Force Survey by a Bayesian bootstrap method. It is an adaptation of the hot-deck method, which seeks to fully exploit the auxiliary information. Important auxiliary information is given by the previous ILO status, when available, and the standard demographic variables.

Missing data can be interpreted more generally, as in the framework of the expectation maximization (EM) algorithm. The second example is from the Scottish House Condition Survey, and its focus is on the inconsistency of the surveyors. The surveyors assess the sampled dwelling units on a large number of elements or features of the dwelling, such as internal walls, roof and plumbing, that are scored and converted to a summarizing 'comprehensive repair cost.' The level of inconsistency is estimated from the discrepancies between the pairs of assessments of doubly surveyed dwellings. The principal research questions concern the amount of information that is lost as a result of the inconsistency and whether the naive estimators that ignore the inconsistency are unbiased. The problem is solved by multiple imputation, generating plausible scores for all the dwellings in the survey.

Description:

In the United States, the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) is linked to the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) at the primary sampling unit level (the same counties, but not necessarily the same persons, are in both surveys). The NHANES examines about 5,000 persons per year, while the NHIS samples about 100,000 persons per year. In this paper, we present and develop properties of models that allow NHIS and administrative data to be used as auxiliary information for estimating quantities of interest in the NHANES. The methodology, related to Fay-Herriot (1979) small-area models and to calibration estimators in Deville and Sarndal (1992), accounts for the survey designs in the error structure.

Description: Release published in The Daily – Statistics Canada’s official release bulletin

Description: Release published in The Daily – Statistics Canada’s official release bulletin

Description: This infographic details the prevalence of vitamin D inadequacy among the Canadian population aged 3 to 79 by focusing on risk factors as well as behaviours that can reduce the likelihood of low vitamin D.

Description: Release published in The Daily – Statistics Canada’s official release bulletin

Description: Release published in The Daily – Statistics Canada’s official release bulletin

Description: Release published in The Daily – Statistics Canada’s official release bulletin

Description: Release published in The Daily – Statistics Canada’s official release bulletin

Description: Release published in The Daily – Statistics Canada’s official release bulletin

Description: A series of articles on various subjects which explore the impact of COVID-19 on the socio-economic landscape. New articles will be released periodically.

Description: This article provides insights into the rates of COVID-19 mortality among First Nations peoples and Métis living in private dwellings and the social determinants of COVID-19 mortality among these populations using data from the 2016 Canadian Census Health and Environment Cohorts linked to the Canadian Vital Statistics – Death Database from 2016 to 2021.

Description: This article uses 12 months of data from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) and LFS supplement for 2022, and the 2016 General Social Survey on Canadians at Work and Home to explore several quality of employment indicators based on Statistics Canada's Statistical Framework on Quality of Employment among the core working age First Nations people living off reserve and Métis (18 to 64 years), in the 10 provinces.

Description: This Juristat article explores recent trends in police-reported sexual assault and other selected types of violent crime, following the implementation of changes to the Uniform Crime Reporting Survey in 2018. Analysis includes a focus on clearance status and victim, accused person and incident characteristics, comparing results from 2017 to the years that followed the changes.

Description: The Canadian Income Survey (CIS) has introduced improvements to the methods and data sources used to produce income and poverty estimates with the release of its 2022 reference year estimates. Foremost among these improvements is a significant increase in the sample size for a large subset of the CIS content. The weighting methodology was also improved and the target population of the CIS was changed from persons aged 16 years and over to persons aged 15 years and over. This paper describes the changes made and presents the approximate net result of these changes on the income estimates and data quality of the CIS using 2021 data. The changes described in this paper highlight the ways in which data quality has been improved while having little impact on key CIS estimates and trends.

Description: This study examined the impact of federal business innovation and growth support (BIGS) programs on firm financial performance measured using revenue, profit and employment metrics. Using Statistics Canada’s Business Linkable File Environment data, the study observed the effects of BIGS on exporting versus non-exporting firms and Canadian- versus U.S.-owned firms from 2015 to 2020. Unlike previous studies that relied mainly on survey data, one significant aspect of this research was the use of a new dataset, enabling panel data structures and models to be employed. To assess the impact of BIGS and research and development spending on three interrelated measures of firm financial performance, the CDM (Crépon et al., 1998) framework was adopted.

Description: This article provides perspectives on the extent to which recent changes in gross domestic product per capita represent a departure from their long-term trend and discusses factors that have facilitated per capita growth in previous decades.

Description: Many seniors work past their mid-60s for various reasons. Some find it necessary to keep working because of inadequate retirement savings, mortgage payments, unforeseen expenses, or the responsibility to support children and other family members in Canada or abroad. Others choose to work to provide a sense of personal fulfillment, stay active and remain engaged. This article uses data from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) and examines the degree to which Canadian-born and immigrant seniors aged 65 to 74 worked by choice or necessity in 2022.

Description: Since Canada is a vast country with diverse job opportunities available in various locations, some provinces and territories may face challenges and opportunities in retaining and attracting young skilled talent. This article is the first to inform the issue by determining the share of youth who grew up in a certain province or territory and eventually obtained a postsecondary education but left to work in another province or territory. The article also looks at young skilled workers who entered a province or territory to work, as a share of that province or territory’s initial population of homegrown young skilled labour.

Description: This article provides an integrated summary of recent changes in output, consumer prices, employment, and household finances. It highlights changes in the economic data during the second half of 2023 and into the winter months. The article also examines how economic conditions have changed as borrowing costs have risen.

Description: The participation of women-owned businesses in exports is important for policies aiming to ensure that the benefits of international trade reach all groups. Women-owned small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Canada are as likely to export as those owned by men, and their export intensity (exports as a share of total sales) was not significantly different. This article examines factors related to the exporting success of women-owned small and medium-sized enterprises in Canada.

Description: Social connections and relationships are important, yet often overlooked, indicators of well-being. For immigrants, these networks are also important for integration. This study examines how immigrant women’s sociodemographic characteristics and life-course circumstances are associated with the size and composition of their personal networks and provides comparisons with Canadian-born women.

Description:

This publication discusses the social, economic, and demographic changes affecting the lives of Canadians.

Free downloadable PDF and HTML files: Published every six weeks Printed issue: Published every six months (twice per year)

Description:

This service bulletin presents summary information, timely financial and operating statistics and analysis (time series, charts, special tabulations, etc.) covering bus, urban transit, courier and local messengers industry, taxi and limousine services industry and marine transportation.

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This publication presents Canada's asset and liability position with non-residents, with a detailed breakdown by claims (direct investment, portfolio, etc.) by industry and by country or organization (United States, United Kingdom, European Union, Japan, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and all other countries). The data also include the foreign holdings of Canada's public debt. In addition, data are provided on Canadian portfolio investments abroad and on the investment income arising from Canada's external assets and liabilities. This publication includes several pages of data analysis accompanied by graphics, definitions and data quality measures. Statistics are derived from surveys, administrative data and other sources.

Description:

This monthly periodical is Statistics Canada's flagship publication for economic statistics. Each issue contains a monthly summary of the economy, major economic events and a feature article. A statistical summary contains a wide range of tables and graphs on the principal economic indicators for Canada, the provinces and the major industrial nations. A historical listing of this same data is contained in the Canadian economic observer: historical supplement (Catalogue no. 11-210-XPB and XIB).

Description:

This free online periodical provides summary information on issues and gives access to education indicators and Canadian education analysis. It presents information, statistics and analysis in a non-technical, highly readable format for teachers, students, parents, education associations, researchers and policy makers. It is published bimonthly by Statistics Canada's Centre for Education Statistics.

Description: This paper examines the revisions published in 2011 to Canadian and the United States business sector labour productivity estimates and related variables. In addition to the usual three years revision cycle of the Canadian National Accounts, hours worked in Canada were revised back to 1981 to incorporate the historical revision of the Labour Force Survey published in January 2011. The United States National Accounts estimates were revised back to 2003 and hours worked back to 2002.

Description:

This annual report presents national data on the deaths investigated by Coroners and Medical Examiners (C/ME). These deaths are examined based on their type - natural, accidental, suicide, homicide or undetermined. In addition, the data will be placed in context based on detailed information specific to the circumstances surrounding the death, such as the location of the event leading to death, the activity at the time of the event leading to death, and the use of any safety devices. C/MEs hold data on deaths reported to the offices in their province or territory. The Canadian Coroner and Medical Examiner Database (CCMED) project grew out of recognition that the availability of national level information about the circumstances of deaths that come to the attention of C/MEs will strengthen the ability of the health, justice and other sectors to take measures to protect Canadians from further preventable deaths.

Description:

This series examines the functional limitations - physical, emotional and social - that affect Canadians with various diseases and health conditions. These descriptions and classifications are the first step in a new approach to measuring the health of Canadians that examines what factors are adversely affecting population health and how to address them.

This information is primarily intended to document the disease classifications used in the Population Health Impact of Disease in Canada (PHI) research program. It also provides health professionals, advocacy groups, and individual Canadians with an overview of how living with various diseases or health conditions affects day-to-day functioning throughout the various phases of disease progression and treatment.

Description:

Statistics Canada is engaged in the "Information System for Science and Technology Project" to develop useful indicators of activity and a framework to tie them together into a coherent picture of science and technology (S&T) in Canada. The working papers series is used to publish results of the different initiatives conducted within this project. The data are related to the activities, linkages and outcomes of S&T. Several key areas are covered such as: innovation, technology diffusion, human resources in S&T and interrelations between different actors involved in S&T. This series also presents data tabulations taken from regular surveys on research and development (R&D) and S&T and made possible by the project.

Description:

Literacy for Life, is the second report from the Adult Literacy and Life Skills Survey. It presents additional results on the nature and magnitude of the literacy gaps faced by OECD countries and how these gaps have evolved over the medium term.

It offers new insights into the factors that influence the formation of adult skills in various settings - at home and at work - for the eleven countries participating in the first and last round of data collection between 2003 and 2008. The study offers comparative evidence on the impact of various factors on the supply of skill. The study offers a special focus on numeracy skills and problem solving skills. It explores the relationships between numeracy and key socio-demographic factors as well as labour market outcomes and earnings.

It highlights the importance of problem solving skills by defining this foundational skill and by exploring its determinants as well as its relative role in influencing important labour market outcomes.

The report offers also an analysis of performance across multiple skill domains. It investigates the skill profiles of various population groups defined in terms of the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of those who score at levels deemed to be low in one or more skill domains and explores the resulting consequences.

The report concludes by investigating the issue of skill mismatch in the labour market and its relationship to adult learning. The extent and distribution of mismatch between the day to day literacy related requirements of workers and the literacy skills they have obtained is an important issue that is being explored in this study.