1. 1 Standard of living measures Stephen P. Jenkins Institute for Social and Economic Research Email: stephenj@essex.ac.ukstephenj@essex.ac.uk

2. 2 The diversity of potential SoL measures: monetary & non-monetary For example: 1.money income (aggregated over a number of income sources) 2.‘consumption’ – expenditures (aggregated over a number of headings), and other indicators 3.financial wealth and other assets 4.multiple non-monetary indicators of deprivation or hardship, and associated summary indices 5.subjective measures of financial well-being, satisfaction, and happiness  SoL measures are used both as outcomes and predictors

3. 3 SoL measures: current practice 1.Household income: most commonly used measure, including in official monitoring of poverty and living standards in UK, Europe and elsewhere – e.g. BHPS, ECHP, EU-SILC, PSID, SIPP, GSOEP, etc. 2.Consumption expenditure: emphasised by economists – few detailed comprehensive measures in longitudinal surveys (focus of selected items, e.g. housing, food, durables) 3.Wealth data – detailed & regular for e.g. housing; fewer detailed and comprehensive, or regularly collected, measures 4.Material deprivation indicators: now supplementing UK and EU official monitoring – e.g. BHPS, ECHP 5.Subjective measures: growing interest – e.g. BHPS, GSOEP  No survey currently contains all measures

4. 4 Top-level issues What are the most important research questions to be addressed using SoL measures, now and potentially in the future? Which of the measures cited (or others) should receive priority? How important is continuity of measurement relative to the existing BHPS, and comparability with other UK national surveys? To what extent is cross-national comparability an important consideration?

5. 5 Some common definitional issues Optimal data collection frequency? – e.g. sub-annual, annual, less frequent Reference period? – e.g. current versus annual for income/expenditure How comprehensive a measure is really required? – e.g. specific aspects of total income/expenditure/wealth versus aggregate itself – e.g. domain satisfactions versus overall happiness – e.g. which indicators of deprivation Which ‘unit(s)’ necessary for? – each adult? each individual? key persons? household?

6. 6 Various data collection issues Relative pay-offs to different methods of data collection? – e.g. face-to-face interviews versus telephone or web; – e.g. interviewer-derived versus self-completion; – e.g. non-traditional tools of data collection – e.g. use of proxy respondents Relative pay-offs to different levels of detail – e.g. exact amounts, grouped, unfolding bracket – e.g. number of categories in a deprivation indicator or happiness measure