Assessing the devolution revolution: How accurate are state-level estimates from the current population survey

The devolution of many social policy responsibilities from the Federal government to states has prompted increased interest in state-level measures of need. One data source that could be used to provide more state-level information on a variety of topics is the Current Population Survey (CPS). During the past ten years the CPS has been used to produce state-level estimates on a variety of measures. However, there has been little systematic evaluation of these data. This paper provides measures of accuracy for several state-level estimates derived from the CPS. These include standard errors for single-year estimates, three-year averages, and five-year averages of the March CPS measures; standard errors for three-year averages of 12-month CPS files; and comparison of CPS-based estimates to data from the Decennial Census. The paper also examines the relative accuracy of CPS estimates based on states' size. The information in this study will help analysts better understand the tradeoffs between timeliness and accuracy to be considered when using state-level estimates derived from the CPS.     

How well can we track cohabitation using the SIPP? A consideration of direct and inferred measures

Cohabitation is an alternative to marriage and to living independently for an increasing number of Americans. Still, research that explores links between living arrangements and economic behavior is limited by a lack of data that explicitly identify cohabiting couples. To aid researchers in using the Survey of Income and Program Participation's (SIPP) rich data to explore cohabitation issues, we consider direct and inferred measures of cohabitation. We find, first, that the use of inferred definitions (relative to direct measures) in the SIPP is likely to yield higher cohabitation rates in the United States by incorrectly coding roommates as cohabitors. Second, the SIPP (whether by direct or inferred measures) counts a significantly larger number of cohabiting couples than the widely used Current Population Survey (CPS). Third, spells of cohabitation occur less frequently and last longer when a direct measure of cohabitation is used than when either of the two inferred measures of cohabitation is used; ours is the first article to reveal this result.     

Panel Conditioning in Longitudinal Studies: Evidence From Labor Force Items in the Current Population Survey

Does participating in a longitudinal survey affect respondents?? answers to subsequent questions about their labor force characteristics? In this article, we investigate the magnitude of panel conditioning or time-in-survey biases for key labor force questions in the monthly Current Population Survey (CPS). Using linked CPS records for household heads first interviewed between January 2007 and June 2010, our analyses are based on strategic within-person comparisons across survey months and between-person comparisons across CPS rotation groups. We find considerable evidence for panel conditioning effects in the CPS. Panel conditioning downwardly biases the CPS-based unemployment rate, mainly by leading people to remove themselves from its denominator. Across surveys, CPS respondents (claim to) leave the labor force in greater numbers than otherwise equivalent respondents who are participating in the CPS for the first time. The results cannot be attributed to panel attrition or mode effects. We discuss implications for CPS-based research and policy as well as for survey methodology more broadly.     

Assessing post-census state poverty estimates

While the decennial census provides poverty figures for states and other subnational geographic units every ten years, their utility declines over the course of a decade. Consequently, there is growing interest in producing post-census estimates for a variety of indicators. This study extends recent efforts to estimate post-census poverty figures for states by producing such estimates using a multiple regression approach. The accuracy of the multiple regression estimates along with recently produced estimates from the Current Population Survey (CPS) are evaluated relative to the decennial census. The mean absolute percentage point error (MAPPE) using the ratio-correlation technique (1.56 percentage points) was somewhat higher than the MAPPE of 1989 CPS (1.37 percentage points) and an average of 1988–1990 CPS data (1.15 percentage points). However, a simple regression technique using data from 1979 to estimate poverty in 1989 produced a set of estimates where the MAPPE (1.37 percentage points) is nearly as accurate as the single-year CPS estimates. Estimates which average regression estimates and CPS-based estimates are more accurate than either regression or CPS estimates used alone. Several suggestions are offered for improving regression estimates.This article is a revised version of a paper presented at the annual meeting of the Population Association of America, 1–4 April 1993, Cincinnati, OH, USA.     

A Note on Maritally-Disrupted Men’s Reports of Child Support in the June 1980 Current Population Survey

Data from the June 1980 Current Population Survey on fathers’ reported provision offinancial support to children from previous marriages living elsewhere is compared to previously published tabulations from the April 1979 CPS of women’s receipt of child support payments. The comparison indicates that the number of men with children from previous marriages living elsewhere is substantially underreported in the June 1980 CPS. Because of the apparent underreporting, the data on the provision of financial support should be interpreted with caution.     

<Emphasis Type="Bold">Interstate Migration and Employer-to-Employer Transitions in the United States: New Evidence From Administrative Records Data</Emphasis>

Declines in migration across labor markets have prompted concerns that the U.S. economy is becoming less dynamic. In this study, we examine the relationship between residential migration and employer-to-employer transitions in the United States, using both survey and administrative records data. We first note strong disagreement between the Current Population Survey (CPS) and other migration statistics on the timing and severity of any decline in U.S. interstate migration. Despite these divergent patterns for overall residential migration, we find consistent evidence of a substantial decline in economic migration between 2000 and 2010. We find that composition and the returns to migration have limited ability to explain recent changes in interstate migration.     

How does POSSLQ measure up? Historical estimates of cohabitation

We use March Current Population Survey (CPS) data from 1977 to 1997 to produce a new historical series of indirect cohabitation prevalence estimates. We compare our new estimates with those produced by the traditional method and evaluate the new estimates. We then compare the indirect estimates with the new direct estimates to investigate whether biases exist in the indirect estimates. Our findings indicate that the traditional indirect method of estimating cohabitation prevalence underestimates cohabitors in different subpopulations, especially among those with children. We also find that the new indirect measure produces relatively unbiased estimates of cohabitors' characteristics.     

The contraceptive prevalence survey project: content and status

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) selected Westinghouse Health Systems to carry out contraceptive surveys. The primary objectives of the Contraceptive Prevalence Surveys (CPS) are to determine periodically the levels of contraceptive use in the country; to examine the correlates of and differentials in these levels in order to assess the impact of various types of governmental and nongovernmental programs; to identify factors that will facilitate an increase in contraceptive use, particularly factors involved in program planning activities; and to institutionalize in each country the capability to design and implement studies of contraceptive prevalence, to be undertaken at regular intervals by an in-country agency. Each CPS generally collects data on the basic demographic background of the country concerned, knowledge of contraceptive methods, prior contraceptive experience and current method used, past fertility behavior and future fertility intentions, present utilization of various types of service delivery systems, perceived accessibility of contraceptives, and reasons for nonacceptance of contraception. In the CPS project, data collection and field operations have been strongly stressed. Efforts have recently been made to expand the extent and sophistication of CPS data analysis. For example, 2 countries are currently using a series of mathematical techniques called synthetic estimators to estimate subnational levels of contraceptive use by merging CPS and census data. Westinghouse, in cooperation with the University of Michigan, is currently working to develop community characteristics module for inclusion in future CPS projects.     

Measuring Cohabitation and Family Structure in the United States: Assessing the Impact of New Data From the Current Population Survey

In 2007, the Current Population Survey (CPS) introduced a measure that identifies all cohabiting partners in a household, regardless of whether they describe themselves as ??unmarried partners?? in the relationship to householder question. The CPS now also links children to their biological, step-, and adoptive parents. Using these new variables, we analyze the prevalence of cohabitation as well as the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of different-sex cohabiting couples during the years 2007?C2009. Estimates of cohabitation produced using only unmarried partnerships miss 18?% of all cohabiting unions and 12?% of children residing with cohabiting parents. Although differences between unmarried partners and most newly identified cohabitors are small, newly identified cohabitors are older, on average, and are less likely to be raising shared biological or adopted children. These new measures also allow us to identify a small number of young, disadvantaged couples who primarily reside in households of other family members, most commonly with parents. We conclude with an examination of the complex living arrangements and poverty status of American children, demonstrating the broader value of these new measures for research on American family and household structure.     

Differences in registering and voting between native-born and naturalized Americans

Relatively little is known about the differences in voting behavior between immigrantsand native-born Americans, primarily due to a lack of good quality data on the national level. Using data from the Voting and Registration Supplement to the November 1996 Current Population Survey (CPS), we examine whether variables known to affect electoral participation among the citizen population are also important among naturalized citizens. We find that naturalized citizens are less likely to register and to vote than native-born citizens, net of other factors. Citizens born abroad in Europe, Latin America, and Asia are less likely to register and those born abroad in Europe and Asia are less likely to vote than those born in the U.S. Among naturalized citizens, region of origin does not remain a major explanatory variable once time in the U.S. is considered.     

Foreign-born emigration: A new approach and estimates based on matched CPS files

The utility of postcensal population estimates depends on the adequate measurement of four major components of demographic change: fertility, mortality, immigration, and emigration. Of the four components, emigration, especially of the foreign-born, has proved the most difficult to gauge. Without "direct" methods (i.e., methods identifying who emigrates and when), demographers have relied on indirect approaches, such as residual methods. Residual estimates, however are sensitive to inaccuracies in their constituent parts and are particularly ill-suited for measuring the emigration of recent arrivals. Here we introduce a new method for estimating foreign-born emigration that takes advantage of the sample design of the Current Population Survey (CPS): repeated interviews of persons in the same housing units over a period of 16 months. Individuals appearing in a first March Supplement to the CPS but not the next include those who died in the intervening year, those who moved within the country, and those who emigrated. We use statistical methods to estimate the proportion of emigrants among those not present in the follow-up interview. Our method produces emigration estimates that are comparable to those from residual methods in the case of longer-term residents (immigrants who arrived more than 10 years ago), but yields higher--and what appear to be more accurate--estimates for recent arrivals. Although somewhat constrained by sample size, we also generate estimates by age, sex, region of birth, and duration of residence in the United States.     

Capabilities and Well-Being: Evidence Based on the Sen–Nussbaum Approach to Welfare

One of the most significant theoretical contributions to welfare analysis across a range of disciplines has been the development of the capabilities framework by Sen and others. Motivated by the claim that freedom should play a key role in social evaluation, the capabilities framework suggests that we consider what it is that people are free to do, as well as what they actually do. Using data from the British Household Panel Survey in conjunction with a list of substantial values posited by Martha Nussbaum, we contribute to the operationalisation and testing of this approach. Specifically, we suggest that commonly used secondary data sources do provide some information about the capabilities people have and that this can be incorporated into models of (subjective) well-being such as those used by a growing number of labour and health economists. We find evidence that a wide range of capabilities exhibit statistically significant relations to well-being that the relations are complex and slightly different for men and women, and conclude with suggestions for future developments.     

Explaining changes in married mothers’ employment over time

Employment of married mothers with preschool children rose dramatically between 1971 and 1990. Using CPS data, we find that about one-fifth of the increase in labor supply can be attributed to changes in mothers’ demographic characteristics (age, education, and number of children). Changes in the earnings opportunities of new mothers and their husbands explain another one-fifth of the growth in employment. Over the two decades, infants up to three months old became less of a barrier to employment, while women’s labor supply became more sensitive to their own earnings opportunities and less sensitive to those of their husbands.     

The decline in occupational sex segregation during the 19705: census and cps comparisons

An assessment of changes in occupational sex segregation during the 1970s, as measured by the Census and Current Population Survey, is complicated by the recent reclassification of occupations. Once this is taken into account, it is apparent from both the Census and the CPS that there was a decline in occupational sex segregation in the 1970s and that the decline was probably more substantial than in the 1960s.     

Advances in the P/F ratio method for the analysis of birth histories

Abstract One of the most frequently used indirect techniques for deriving estimates of recent fertility from simple questions in censuses and surveys is the 'P/F ratio' method. Availability of detailed birth-history data, as in the World Fertility Survey, and applications of the P/F procedure as a diagnostic tool in the evaluation of the quality of data have led to simplifications and extensions of the original method. This analysis illustrates that when complete maternity histories are available, the P/F procedure can be simplified and made more powerful by (1) calculation of P/F values from cohort-period fertility rates and (2) use of two further indexing variables, namely duration since first marriage and duration since first birth, in addition to age. More generally, the paper indicates that a set of P/F values is only one of a battery of measures which aid in the analysis of trends and errors in data from maternity histories. Illustrative examples are given from various analyses of world Fertility Survey data. Howard Goldberg has been independently pursuing an investigation of the P/F procedure by marriage duration at the Office of Population Research (Princeton University), and we have profited from recent discussions with him. We would also like to acknowledge useful comments and criticisms on earlier drafts from James Trussell and Kenneth Hill.     

The Sibsize Revolution and Social Disparities in Children’s Family Contexts in the United States, 1940–2012

This article points to a sharp decline in children’s sibling numbers (sibsize) that occurred in the United States since the 1970s and was large enough among children with lower socioeconomic status (SES) (particularly black children) to amount to a revolution in their family circumstances. It interprets sibsize decline as a source of social convergence in children’s family contexts that ran counter to trends toward social divergence caused by the rise of lone parenthood. The article is based on new estimates of differences in children’s sibsize and lone parenthood by race and maternal education generated from public-use samples from the Census of Population and Current Population Survey (CPS), focusing especially on the period 1940–2012. I discuss some methodological and substantive challenges for existing scholarship arising from the findings and point to questions for future research.     

No trend in the intergenerational transmission of divorce

Previous studies on trends in the intergenerational transmission of divorce have produced mixed findings, with two studies (McLanahan and Bumpass 1988; Teachman 2002) reporting no trend in divorce transmission and one study (Wolfinger 1999) finding that divorce transmission has weakened substantially. Using a stratified Cox proportional hazard model, we analyze data from the National Survey of Families and Households and find no evidence for any trend in divorce transmission. To reconcile apparent differences in results, we note that the General Social Survey data used by Wolfinger lack information on marital duration, permitting analysis only for whether respondents have divorced by interview. As a result, an apparent decline in divorce transmission could be due to inadequate adjustments for the longer exposures to risk by earlier marriage cohorts, yielding a higher probability of divorce by interview for earlier cohorts relative to more recent cohorts even if divorce risks are identical across all marriage cohorts. We confirm this possibility by using a series of discrete-time hazard logistic regressions to investigate the sensitivity of estimates of trends in divorce transmission to different adjustments for exposure to risk. We conclude that there has been no trend in the intergenerational transmission of divorce.     

Insights from longitudinal data on the earnings growth of U.S. foreign-born men

Does the growth in earnings of foreign-born men exceed that of U.S. natives? We use longitudinal data on earnings from a Social Security Administration (SSA) database matched to the 1994 March Current Population Survey to shed new light on this important issue. We also examine the trend over time in the foreign-born men's earnings growth and illuminate the various ways that SSA data can be used to explore the earnings patterns of immigrants.     

Family Structure and Children’s Economic Well-Being: Incorporating Same-Sex Cohabiting Mother Families

Research on family structure and child well-being rarely includes children in same-sex parent families, a notable omission since 28 % of female–female couple households contain children. Using the 2010–2013 pooled current population survey (CPS), we examined children’s economic well-being by family structure. These data were ideal for this study because they included a sizeable number of children in same-sex cohabiting mother families and the CPS measured both official and supplemental poverty, incorporating the cohabiting partner. Using the official poverty measure, children in same-sex cohabiting mother families were more likely to be poor than their counterparts in either different-sex cohabiting or married parent families. Using the supplemental poverty measure, children in same-sex mother families were no more likely to be poor than children in all other types of different-sex two-parent families.     

Integrating Census Data to Support a Motion for Change of Venue

This applied demography case study illustrates the practical application of demographic concepts and methods to an issue facing the court. We show how census data can be used to support a legal motion for a change of venue. “Change of venue,” the legal term for moving a trial to a new location, usually is sought to avoid prejudice against one of the parties to a lawsuit. The case study will interest demographic practitioners, and it can be used as an instructional case in teaching applied demography: students can replicate it using data for any particular pair of populous metropolitan communities. By doing so, students would gain proficiency working with Public Use Microdata Sample (PUMS) household records—and the person records within household records—to identify and categorize family and nonfamily relationships among household members, and practical experience translating legal issues into questions that can be answered empirically using American Community Survey (ACS) data.