Supplement Your Reporting With CPS and SIPP

Supplement Your Reporting With CPS and SIPP

Robert GebeloffThe New York Times

[email protected]

McCormick SRI: Going Deep with Census Demographic and Economic Data0:00


ACS vs. CPS

Most journalists are familiar with the American Community

Survey, because it produces local data. But CPS has several

advantages…



ACS vs. CPS•CPS is more current




-- Survey is conducted monthly, drives data on unemployment




-- Survey is conducted monthly, drives data on unemployment

-- March supplement asks additional questions that cover major

demographic topics akin to ACS



ACS vs. CPSLinks:

Main CPS Page: http://www.census.gov/cps/


http://www.census.gov/cps/

CPS data demo

3:09

Supplement Your Reporting With CPS and SIPPACS vs. CPS

Links:Main CPS Page:

http://www.census.gov/cps/Example:

Income by Educational Attainment:http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/cpstables/032010/perinc/new03_001.htm

All Years: http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income

/data/incpovhlth/2009/index.html


http://www.census.gov/cps/

http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/cpstables/032010/perinc/new03_001.htm

http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/cpstables/032010/perinc/new03_001.htm

CPS data demo

4:22

Supplement Your Reporting With CPS and SIPPACS vs. CPS

The CPS is the preferred source for national analysis … It provides the most timely and most accurate cross-section

data for the nation on income and poverty and is the official source of

national poverty estimates. The ACS is preferred for subnational data on income and poverty by detailed

demographic characteristics, because of its large sample size. (source)



ACS vs. CPSCPS covers ground not covered by

ACSExample:

http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/cpstables/032010/health/h06_000.ht

m(ACS began asking in 2008, CPS 1980)


CPS data demo

10:55


Customizing CPS vis IPUMS

Thanks to the Minnesota Population Center, It’s Possible to Build

Sophisticated Customized CPS TablesExample:

http://cps.ipums.org/cps/sdahttp://cps.ipums.org/cps-action/

variables/group


Demo CPS data via IPUMS

12:24

Supplement Your Reporting With CPS and SIPPCustomizing CPS vis IPUMS

-- Click on “Analyze All Samples”-- in Row, put “year”

-- in Column, put “ownershp”-- in Selection Filter, put “relate(101)”

For now, uncheck percentaging, color coding, and change type of chart to “no

chart”Click “Run Table”…



Customizing CPS vis IPUMS

One of the great things about the IPUMS interface is that is calculates percentages AND the standard error

for you.Go back to query window and click “row percentages” and “confidence

intervals”



17:00

Supplement Your Reporting With CPS and SIPPCustomizing CPS vis IPUMS

Explore… go back again and add age(25-34) to the filter. Run table..

One more time, go back and add “sex” to the control to split the table by gender.

And one more – add “nativity(5)” to the filter to limit our results to foreign born.

Note how standard error grows larger as you add more nuance to your analysis



Customizing CPS vis IPUMSAnother cool feature – you can

recode or collapse variables into groups.

Sticking with current example, delete age(25-34) and nativity(5) from the filter and replace sex in the control

with age(c: 10, 25)



19:55

Supplement Your Reporting With CPS and SIPPSIPP: Getting Longitudinal

SIPP is potentially a rich source of story material, but it's rarely used by

journalists for two primary reasons: A) It requires a fairly high level of

technical skill to process the SIPP data files and

B) As a longitudinal study, it requires a much different analytical approach than

most Census data.



SIPP: Getting Longitudinal

SIPP is a survey of about 45,000 households that is different from

other surveys in several key ways. Both the annual CPS and ACS survey are "cross-sectional", in that they are

based on a random sample of the population that is generate freshly

every year.




SIPP, on the other hand, is "longitudinal", in that the SIPP

sample is drawn once and then those households are re-interviewed every

four months.



SIPP: Getting Longitudinal For example , CPS can tell you the

unemployment rate of college graduates over time, on an annual

basis. (Unemployment among college grads has jumped from X to Y

between 2005 and 2010).



SIPP, on the other hand, tracks specific people over time.

it can tell you how many college graduates went from employed to unemployment in

the second half of 2008… or the percentage of new food stamp households that had previously earned

more than $100,000 …or how many workers who got new jobs are earning less than they had been making in

their previous job.


The Unique Value of SIPP*

• To provide a nationally representative sample for evaluating:– annual and sub-annual dynamics of income– movements into and out of government transfer

programs– family and social context of individuals and households– interactions between these items

*Stolen from David Johnson, U.S. Census Bureau

24:02


SIPP: Getting LongitudinalSIPP is also a much more detailed

survey -- for example, whereas CPS tracks several dozen income sources,

SIPP tracks 70. SIPP also tracks a broad-array of assets beyond income, whereas most Census surveys only ask about home

ownership and value.



SIPP: Getting LongitudinalThe hierarchy of SIPP data is also quite

different than other Census surveys. The SIPP survey is divided into "panels"

and "waves". The panel is the initial sample, and can run either 3, 4 or 5

years based on both demographic and budgetary factors. We're currently in the 2008 panel and the plan is for this

panel to go either 4 or five years.



Once the panel is drawn, the bureau surveys participants every four months,

and those intervals are called waves. During each wave survey, participants are asked the series of questions and

provide answers for each of the pervious four months -- for example,

"Were you employed in January, Were you employed in February, etc." -- this

allows for the creation of a monthly time series



SIPP: Getting LongitudinalSIPP is frequently under the budget

gun, so plans don’t always match reality – possible SIPP interview frequency will be cut back, for

example…



SIPP: Getting LongitudinalSIPP incorporates sub-surveys –

“topical” modules that ask additional questions about a given

subject. (http://www.census.gov/sipp/top_m

od/2008/topmod08.html)


Demo SIPP data

27:00


SIPP: Getting LongitudinalProblem for Journalists:

-- 750 fields of data difficult to digest-- small community of users, mostly

academic-- because SIPP is so unique, can’t

always compare analysis to published tables




Census SIPP staff puts out their own research:

http://www.census.gov/sipp/p70s/p70s.html


Demo SIPP data

28:28


SIPP: Getting LongitudinalExample: Dynamics of Economic Well-Being: Fluctuations in the

U.S. Income Distribution, 2004–2007 (P70-124)

•Approximately 12.3 million U.S. households (11.5 percent) experienced changes in their annual income between 2004 and

2007 that resulted in their moving either up or down two or more quintiles in the income distribution.

•Of these 12.3 million households, approximately 2.3 million households in the bottom quintile and 2.0 million households in the second quintile experienced the largest percentage of gains

in annual household income between 2004 and 2007.•Of these 12.3 million households, 5.0 million households that started in the top and fourth quintiles experienced a decline of

two or more quintiles between 2004 and 2007.



SIPP: Getting LongitudinalGetting started with the data?

The National Bureau of Economic Research has a SIPP page

(http://www.nber.org/data/survey-of-income-and-program-

participation-sipp-data.html) with instructions and import specs:


Demo SIPP data

29:40


SIPP: Getting LongitudinalDataFerrett:

http://dataferrett.census.gov/-- get data – run (might require java

update)-- enter e-mail (for saving work), get

data-- See SIPP on bottom of list, pick

wave 1


Demo SIPP with DataFerrett

31:15


SIPP: Getting LongitudinalDataFerrett:

--search for variables: rfb1r1, wpfinwgt, erace

-- step 2, Databasket, make table-- Drag rfb1r1 to the first column,

drag erace to the second-- Turn on weighting, get data

-- Show percent of first data column




This is just a superficial example – SIPP is very rich but would require

more in-depth study to use effectively. Best starting point would be to find a source who uses it and is

willing to share.


Supplement Your Reporting With CPS and SIPP

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