Developing the income data in the Scottish Household Survey Chris Martin, Associate Director, Ipsos MORI Income and Poverty Statistics Seminar 11 th June

2 Content Brief introduction to the income data in the SHS Remit of the review/feasibility study Implications for the data Discussion

3 …a bottom up approach Total Net Household Income Earnings Other jobs Spouse HIH Main job BenefitsMiscellaneous Sources DisabilityNon-disability Income support Jobseekers Allowance Statutory Sick Pay DLA + 10 Others State Pension Child Benefit Housing Benefit Dig Money Invalid Care Allowance Incapacity Benefit Attendance Allowance + 6 Others Investment Income Maintenance payments Private pension Student loan + 5 Others

4 How income is derived Questionnaire  Earnings – -Are you (& your spouse) employed? -How many jobs? -Amount received/over what period -Net or Gross amount  Benefits/other sources -Do you (or your partner) receive any of these benefits/other sources? -Who receives it? -Amount received/over what period. Data processing  Calculate annual amounts for each component  Convert gross earnings to net earnings  Clean data (examine outliers, compare with other variables)  Impute missing values (refusals and don’t knows) using various methods for each component separately  Sum all components  Any household with less than £50 per week set to missing

5 Remit of the review Examine definition of total net household income  Extending the estimate to include all adult household members? -By using FRS data to model likely amounts? -By extending the questionnaire? -By imputing this information?  Imputing income for households where it is currently set to missing? Examine the design of the questionnaire  How the questions are structured.  The current coverage of the sources of income (particularly “investment income”  Harmonisation between the SHS and other surveys (the SHCS, possibly learning from the FRS). Examine the imputation routines used.  An additional annual re-imputation (currently all undertaken on a quarterly basis)?  Imputing missing income for the SHS and the SHCS together.

6 Discussion points Were you aware that Local Authority level income data was available from the SHS? Do you currently use income data from the SHS? If so, how and what for? If not, why? Do you think work is required to estimate the income of all householders, so that equivalised income could be calculated? How would you use improved income data from the SHS? What decisions would you hope to be able to base on results from SHS analysis? How important do you think harmonisation with other household surveys is?