Transcript Slide 1

The Improvement of HBS in the
Republic of Moldova
European Conference on Quality in Official Statistics,
Rome, Italy
Lilian Galer, [email protected]
Ala Negruta, [email protected]
Areas of improvement
Questionnaire improvements
Sampling improvements
The HBS
 The HBS is an important source of economic and social
data, it provides data on:
 Measures of living standards
 Consumption and income structure
 Weights for consumer price index
 Various estimates for the National Accounts
 The HBS can inform economic and social policy and
monitor the impact of government reforms
 It is a continuous activity of the NBS, with household
interviews conducted throughout the year, and
households completing both a general interview and a
‘diary’ in which households report consumption and
income
Questionnaire improvements (I)
 In 2004 and 2005 the NBS conducted various experiments in
order to improve the questionnaire design, such experiments
guided the changes implemented in 2006
 The main questionnaire changes affected the following areas:
 Changes in the reference period of some income sources
and expenditure items
 Modification of Diary - improved layout of the diary (the
questionnaire booklet that helps the household to record
income and expenditure transactions)
 Re-adjustment of the definitions of employment indicators
and household members
Questionnaire improvements (II)
Reference period
The HBS used to rely on current monthly expenditure to estimate household
consumption expenditure
While this provides good national average estimates, it can be misleading
when our purpose is to compare households’ living standards
Indicators
Before 2006
From 2006
current month
current month
2. Incomes from individual agricultural activity
current month
last 12 months and
current month
3. Expenditures for individual agricultural activity
current month
last 12 months and
current month
current month for all
types of utilities
current month and the
last 12 months for
some types
(central heating,
wood, coal, gas)
5. Expenditures for food products procurement
current month
Half a month
6. Consumption of products from own production and
the ones received for free
current month
1.
Cash incomes of household’s members
4. Expenditures for utility services
On a weekly basis
during the month
of interview
Questionnaire improvements (III)
Reference period
 Example of expenditure for central heating in 2007
 98% of households with central heating reported such
expenditure when asked about expenses in the last 12
months
 But only 52% of households with central heating reported
expenditure in the current month
 When assessing living standards we should include the
average monthly expenditure and not how much the
household spent in January or July
 This problem occurs when we deal with ‘seasonal’
consumption items and more generally for items that are
purchased at a frequency lower than one month
 When using only the current month expenditure we overestimate the level of inequality
Questionnaire improvements (III)
Effects of questionnaire changes
 Collected information can now be used to produce both
accurate averages for the National Accounts, weights for
the consumer price index, and distributional data for
poverty analysis. In particular poverty and inequality data
have improved
 There is a reduced household burden for the
participation to the survey (the household needs to
spend less time to complete the required information)
 Improvement in the measurement of some key statistics
(remittances and agricultural income)
 Employment data are now collected ensuring
comparability with definitions used in the Labour Force
Survey
Questionnaire improvements (IV)
Effects of questionnaire changes
medii lunare pe o
persoană, lei
1400
1200
1000
800
600
400
200
0
2004
2005
CBGC
2006
CN
2007
 Both income and
consumption are
now estimated at
much higher
levels than in
2005
 This is in line with
estimates from the
National accounts
Old HBS sample design
Probability, stratified, two stage sample
 Sample frame:
 I stage – electoral divisions
 II stage – electoral lists
 Stratification:
 Cities
 Towns
 Rural area
 Sample size:
 I stage – 45 PSUs
 II stage – 36 households/quarter/PSU
Necesity of improvements in
sampling
The low quality of the sample frame
Exhaustion of the lists from sample frame
Big design-effect (only 45 PSUs)
Bias generated by multiple replacement of
non-respondents
Reliability of the main estimates assured
only at the national level and residence
area
General characteristics of
EMDOS
 EMDOS – Master Sample for the Social Surveys
 Starting from 01.01.06 the HBS and LFS are carried
out on EMDOS
 Probability, stratified, two stage sample (excepting self
representing cities where it is one stage)
 EMDOS covers 219 localities grouped in 150 PSUs,
including:
97 in rural area;
53 in urban area;
 Reliability of the main estimates at the level of
statistical zones;
 It is used for others surveys in social sphere
Sampling stages
 At the I stage – PSUs’ selection with the
probability proportional to there size. Sample
frame – list of administrative-territorial units of
primary level (PSUs): CUATM.
 At the II stage – simple random sampling of
households in each selected PSU (exception
Chisinau city – proportionally stratified sampling
for HBS). Sample frame – list of households
addresses (SSUs): list of electricity consumers
provided by the electricity companies and
updated with using of special listing procedure.
Stratification criteria
Geographic:





North (Balti separately)
Center
South
Chisinau
Transnistria
Residence area:
 Urban
 Rural
Settlements’ size:
 Big communes
 Small communes
Sample size
Number of PSUs and households per quarter
HBS
Nr of PSUs
in the old
sample
Nr of
households /
quarter in
the old
sample
Nr of
interviewer
s in the old
sample
Nr of PSUs
in EMDOS
Nr of
households/
quarter in
EMDOS
Nr of
interviewers
in EMDOS
45
1620
45
150
2442
150
Changes in sampling
(geographical coverage)
HBS 1997 - 2005
EMDOS from 2006
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PSUs Rotation
≈ 20% of PSUs are replaced annually with new ones
Except for the self-representing PSUs:

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
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
Chisinau mun.
Balti mun.
Comrat mun.
Cahul town
Soroca town
Ungheni town
Reasons:
 Better geographical coverage over time;
 Avoiding the necessity of complete PSU’s replacement after a
certain period
 Provide a good continuous comparability of estimates over
time, etc.
Panel and households
rotation within PSUs
The panel reflect all the changes encountered
within the same households during a period of
time.
 HBS - panel for 5 years
Households’ rotation:
 HBS – ½ of households are in for 5 consecutive
years, and ½ are interviewed only once
Grossing up of Surveys Data
Developing and implementation of
statistical weights computational
procedures, which include:
Base weights calculation and analysis;
Non-responses adjustment procedures;
Poststratification
Reliability estimation
For the computation of estimates reliability
characteristics is used a special variance
estimation technique – BRR with the following
main advantages:
 It allows to estimate variance for complex
sample design (taking into consideration design
effect);
 It can be used for all types of estimators, such
as means, sums, proportions, etc.;
 Relatively simple to use as it is implemented in
most specialized statistical softs – STATA,
WesVar, SAS, R, etc.
Reliability of income estimates,
by quarters (HBS 2005-2007)
8%
2005
Q IV
2006
2007
7%
Q III
CV, %
6%
QI
5%
Q2
4%
QI
Q II
QIV
QI
Q III
3%
Q II
Q III
Q IV
2%
400
500
600
700
800
900
Income per capita, lei
1000
1100
1200
1300
Design Effect over time (HBS
2005-2007)
6
5.5
5.2
5.9
Design Effect
5
3.9
4
3.0
2.5
3
2
1.5
1.7
2q
2006
3q
2006
1.9
1.7
4q
2006
1q
2007
1.9
1.5
1
0
1q
2005
2q
2005
3q
2005
4q
2005
1q
2006
2q
2007
3q
2007
4q
2007
Further activities
 More attention to non-sampling errors
 Using of auxiliary data on electricity for
poststratification
 Data matching
 Small Area Estimation
 Analysis of panel data
 Further questionnaire improvements to capture
in a better way self-employment in nonagriculture, tax and social contribution
payments
Thank You for Your Attention!