1. Robert McCaa rmccaa@umn.edu Antonio López Gay tlopez@pop.umn.edu Representing IPUMS – International Project Minnesota Population Center / University of Minnesota Gender and work in European population censuses: practices in capturing additional female activity Workshop "III Integrating European Census Microdata“ European Population Conference 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008

2. 1. Engendering economic activity: a global perspective acquired from integrating census microdata Outline 2. Conceptual framework for less biased measurement of female economic activity. United Nations Principles and Recommendations 3. European context: capturing additional economic activity (particularly of homemakers) in European population censuses. III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008 4. Conclusions. Europe in global context on capturing secondary economic activity in population censuses.

3. IPUMS-International: most complete archive of census documentation. 800 census forms for the period 1960-2008 Engendering economic activity: a global perspective acquired from integrating census microdata To integrate microdata, study documentation carefully “Best practices” for capturing female economic activity: Learned from UN principles and source documentation Necessary for integrating microdata III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008 This research is part of a global analysis of the world’s enumeration forms. Regional results have been presented for Latin America and Africa.

4. International standards and references in literature are clear: HOMEMAKERS MAY BE ECONOMICALLY ACTIVE. Accurate measurement is an important issue Conceptual framework for unbiased measurement of female economic activity. UN Principles and Recommend. The United Nations Principles and Recommendations have alerted of this point during the last 50 years. Efforts have had an effect: in the 2000 round, in almost all regions of the world, bias was greatly eliminated III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008

5. Better results, showing higher proportions of women as economically active, have been recorded in cases when further probes are used to determine whether those reported as homemakers were in fact involved in some typically misclassified economic activities UN Principles and Recommendations. Series M. Nº 67/Rev.1. 2.174 1998 There is a high risk of misclassifying women as homemakers when only basic questions are asked. Better results, showing higher proportions of women as economically active, have been recorded in cases when further probing questions were used during an interview or more detailed questions were included in a self-administered questionnaire, to ensure that those homemakers involved in some typically misclassified economic activities were assigned to their correct economic activity status. UN Principles and Recommendations, 2.243 2007

6. Conceptual framework for unbiased measurement of female economic activity. UN Principles and Recs. III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008 Bias is more likely where many women work in agriculture or at odd jobs— unless the census questionnaire is carefully designed Biased questionaire: Requests “main activity”; if housewife, end module. Unbiased practices: Requests any economic activity; if housewife, continue with a short list of probes. (Work for pay or profit, family farm/business, crafts for sale…) The United Nations Principles and Recommendations have alerted of this point during the last 50 years. Efforts have had an effect: in the 2000 round, in almost all regions of the world, bias was greatly eliminated International standards and references in literature are clear: HOMEMAKERS MAY BE ECONOMICALLY ACTIVE. Accurate measurement is an important issue

7. 2000 Censuses: the global record on secondary economic activity III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 9th 2008 No Bias Some Bias Substantial Bias Total, if homemaker No census/ques/form Latin America is the region with the fewest biased questionnaires. Research shows that refined questionnaires accurately measure secondary economic activity of home-makers (also pensioners, students and others). Check our interpretation! Forms posted at hist.umn.edu/~rmccaa/IPUMSI/enumform.htm

8. The European experience: capturing secondary female economic activity. 1995-2007: 31 census questionnaires III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008 9 unbiased practices: Bulgaria, Croatia, Italy, Lithuania, Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Switzerland, Ukraine 10 capture some (all??) secondary economic activity: Austria, Belarus, France, Greece, Moldova, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Turkey, United Kingdom 6 omit much female economic activity for lack of probes: Albania, Belgium, Hungary, Ireland, Montenegro, Slovenia 6 skip all female economic activity, if homemaker: Bosnia & Herzegovina, Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Romania, Serbia

9. Example of an unbiased practice! Macedonia, 2002 III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008 Includes conceptual meaning of work (unpaid work in a family shop or enterprise or agriculutral holding/property owned by member of your family)…

10. Example of an unbiased practice! Macedonia, 2002 III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008 Includes the possibility of declaring a secondary activity

11. Example of a possibly biased practice: Latvia, 2000 III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008 If housemaker (conscript, pensioner, or student), skip questions on work.

12. Comparing integrated census microdata activity data with female activity rates for same year from World Bank http://devdata.worldbank.org/genderstats/query/default.htm Female activity rate III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008 Census Year IPUMS rate WB (census year) WB – IPUMS Bias in Census question Austria200165%62%-3None Belarus199966% 0Possibly some Greece200147%50%3Possibly some Hungary200152% 0Possibly some Netherlands200159%66%7Same source? Portugal200162%65%3 None Romania200250%61%11Significant, if homemaker Spain200149%51%2 Possibly some United Kingdom200165%69%4 Possibly some European microdata available from IPUMS-International

13. However, some pose a risk of omitting information regarding female additional activity. The comparison between the WB and census rates in the IPUMS-International database shows that differences between both sources are bigger where practices seem biased. CONCLUSIONS III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008 Most of the census enumeration forms in Europe are designed to obtain an unbiased measurement of female secondary activity. The economic activity structure of the European countries minimizes the risk of poorly measuring additional female activity (smaller percentage of population working in the Agricultural sector compared to other areas of the world).

14. Thank you for entrusting microdata to the research community so that all may contribute to understanding and improving the human condition. CONCLUSIONS. POINTS FOR THE FUTURE III Integrating European Census Microdata & EPC 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008 Census forms for the 2010 round should be carefully tested regarding the capture of additional activity. Sensitive instructions must be provided to the enumerators.

15. Robert McCaa rmccaa@umn.edu Antonio López Gay tlopez@pop.umn.edu Representing IPUMS – International Project Minnesota Population Center / University of Minnesota Gender and work in European population censuses: strategies to capture additional female activity THANKS!!! Workshop "III Integrating European Census Microdata“ & European Population Conference 2008 Barcelona, July 10th 2008