
Household surveys are questionnaires that are given to a sample of households in a population. Their primary advantage is to provide considerable discretion to the interviewer about the information requested of respondents.
What is a “household survey”?
Household surveys collect comprehensive and diverse socio-demographic data pertaining to conditions under which people live — their welfare, demographic characteristics and cultural factors which influence behavior, as well as social and economic change.
How can I learn more about your household surveys?
To learn more about our Household Surveys, use the links below. The new Household Pulse Survey is designed to deploy quickly, and efficiently collect data on how people’s lives have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
What are Household Sample Surveys and why are they important?
While housing censuses are also a key source of such statistics, they are only conducted every 10 to 15 years. Household sample surveys — which can investigate almost any population-based subject — are therefore a powerful alternative, becoming one of the most flexible sources of data on social phenomena in the last few decades.
What is the household Pulse survey?
The new Household Pulse Survey is designed to deploy quickly, and efficiently collect data on how people’s lives have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. An ongoing survey that provides data every year -- giving communities the current information they need to plan investments and services.

What is the meaning of household survey?
Household surveys are questionnaires that are given to a sample of households in a population. Their primary advantage is to provide considerable discretion to the interviewer about the information requested of respondents.
What is the difference between household survey and establishment survey?
The household survey is conducted by the Census Bureau as part of its Current Population Survey. The establishment survey is a survey of private nonfarm businesses (such as factories, stores, and offices) and provides information about employment, hours worked, and employee earnings.
Why is the Census coming to my house?
Census Bureau field representatives return to obtain a measure of the changes (or lack of changes) that have taken place in the number of houses available in the United States, the physical condition of the housing, and the characteristics of the occupants.
What is the difference between family and household census?
The count of family household members differs from the count of family members, however, in that the family household members include all people living in the household, whereas family members include only the householder and his/her relatives.
What is the household jobs survey?
The household survey (CPS) is designed to measure the labor force status of the civilian noninstitutional population with demographic detail. The national unemployment rate is the best-known statistic produced from the household survey.
Is payroll survey more accurate than household survey?
While the experts agree that the payroll survey is a better measure of employment than the household survey, some continue to use the household survey, arguing that growth in entrepreneurship overwhelms the job losses recorded in the payroll survey because the latter does not include self-employment.
What happens if you don't do the census survey?
The census law (Title 13, United States Code, Section 224), coupled with the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 (Title 18, Sections 3551, 3559, and 3571), provides for penalties of up to $5,000 for failure to report, and $10,000 for intentionally providing false information.
Do you have to answer the door to census?
If no one answers the door, and the bureau determines the home is occupied, census workers may try to get information about people living there from proxy respondents, such as neighbors, or from other government records.
Is the census survey legit?
If you have been contacted to participate in a survey and want to verify that it is legitimate, you can search the Census Bureau's list of surveys by name. The name of the Census Bureau survey may be provided in the following ways: In a mailing from the Census Bureau. By a caller from the Census Bureau.
Who are the household members?
Household members include the filer, spouse, dependents and all other individuals who normally live with you that are not dependents.
What determines a household?
A household is a group of people who live together and share money (even if they are not related to each other). If you live together and share money, you are one household. If you live together and don't share money, you are 2+ households.
What does a household consist of?
Under the U.S. Census Bureau definition, family households consist of two or more individuals who are related by birth, marriage, or adoption, although they also may include other unrelated people. Nonfamily households consist of people who live alone or who share their residence with unrelated individuals.
What is establishment survey?
The establishment survey provides information on employment, hours, and earnings of employees on nonfarm payrolls; the data appear in the "B" tables, marked ESTABLISHMENT DATA. BLS collects these data each month from the payroll records of a sample of nonagricultural business establishments.
What are the two surveys within the Bureau of Labor Statistics BLS jobs report?
(BLS, the Bureau) releases data on current employment in the “Employment Situation” news release. The data come from two different surveys: the Current Population Survey (CPS), also known as the household survey, and the Current Employment Statistics (CES) survey, also known as the establishment or payroll survey.
How is the actual unemployment rate calculated?
In general, the unemployment rate in the United States is obtained by dividing the number of unemployed persons by the number of persons in the labor force (employed or unemployed) and multiplying that figure by 100.
How is unemployment calculated?
How is the unemployment rate measured? Unemployment occurs when someone is willing and able to work but does not have a paid job. The unemployment rate is the percentage of people in the labour force who are unemployed. Consequently, measuring the unemployment rate requires identifying who is in the labour force.
How to verify a household survey?
You can also verify that the person contacting you is a Census Bureau employee by entering the name into the Census Bureau Staff Search. If you still have questions or concerns contact the Regional Office for your state and ask, “Am I in a survey?”
What is the new household pulse survey?
The new Household Pulse Survey is designed to deploy quickly, and efficiently collect data on how people’s lives have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
How many surveys are there for the 2020 census?
In addition to the 2020 Census, the Census Bureau conducts more than 30 surveys that invite individuals and households to respond. For more information about the 2020 Census, please visit 2020census.gov. The U.S. Census Bureau compiles information from household surveys other than the 2020 Census to produce statistics that describe populations ...
What is an ongoing survey?
An ongoing survey that provides data every year -- giving communities the current information they need to plan investments and services. Data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau. Statistics released by the U. S. Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau.
What are the problems with household surveys?
Household surveys are also subject to problems, including sampling errors, which depend on the size and structure of the sample, and nonsampling errors caused by nonresponse and underreporting (see Chapter 2 of Atkinson et al., 1995 ). For these reasons, the upper tail of the income distribution tends to be unsatisfactorily covered in sample surveys, unless the rich are oversampled and reporting errors are minimized. The survey-based evidence discussed later in this chapter may be seen as being about the incomes of the bottom 95–99% of the population, and it is thus complementary but not always fully comparable to the results of high incomes based on tax records reported in the final section of this chapter. 6 The specific statistics used in the calculation of poverty and income inequality using household survey data are discussed below in Sections 8.3 and 8.4.1.
Why are household surveys bad?
Household surveys have endemic problems in capturing some income and consumption items and in dealing with selective compliance and underreporting issues.
What is Eurostat statistics?
The EU's statistical agency, Eurostat, provides comparable income survey statistics for the EU member countries. Eurostat initially used a common survey instrument across the European counties but has since switched to an “ex-ante harmonized” framework ( Atkinson et al., 2010a,b ). The European Community Household Panel Survey covered 15 different countries from 1994 to 2001 and was replaced by the SILC. SILC works through the statistical agencies of the different EU member countries and achieves cross-national comparability through adoption of common definitions and concepts key to cross-national comparability of income and other policy-relevant matters in the EU. 7 In 1995 there were 13 countries initially represented, but the number of countries expanded to 22 by 2000 and 30 by 2005. The income distribution measures produced by Eurostat now cover 32 different countries. In contrast to LIS, the Eurostat distribution statistics are produced annually; covering the years between 1995 and 2011 there are 380 year-country observations for the different distributional measures.
Why are business surveys important?
Business surveys are really important in determining the characteristics of the enterprises involved in these kinds of activities. The principal points of inquiry are the number and type of workers, the nature of economic capital used, and the survival strategies of small establishments.
What is a MEPS survey?
The MEPS is a household survey with one person responding for all household members (the Adult SAQ is one exception). Although MEPS requests that this be the person most knowledgeable about health and health care in the family, there may still be issues with proxy responses. For example, a wife may not be aware that her husband sought depression treatment. To account for the potential for underestimating treatment use obtained by proxy, an indicator is included for whether the MEPS sample member is the respondent (proxy=0) or not (proxy=1). Consistent with this worry, the regression results show that proxy respondents are approximately 1% point less likely to use each of the three types of treatment. Of course, proxy status could be correlated with other unmeasured aspects of individuals related to treatment.
Why are the very rich underrepresented in random samples?
Another problem is that because household wealth is extremely skewed, the very rich (the so-called ‘upper tail’ of the distribution) are often considerably underrepresented in random samples. An alternative is to use stratified samples, based typically on income tax returns, which oversample the rich.
What is the IHSN?
The International Household Survey Network (IHSN) acts essentially as a catalog depository for many international organizations that administer household surveys. It is managed by representatives of several major international organizations such as the United Kingdom Department for International Development, UN, WHO, and World Bank. The IHSN’s catalog provides users with links and short descriptions to over 5000 household datasets representing 204 countries from 1890 to the present. Users can search the catalog by keyword or variable description. It is recommended that users consult the “?” button in the search box for a description of search techniques as it strays somewhat from Boolean operators. Users can also filter by year, data restriction, or by country. The country filter allows users to search by country name, income bracket, or region.
What is the new household pulse survey?
The new Household Pulse Survey is designed to deploy quickly, and efficiently collect data on how people’s lives have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
How many surveys are conducted in a year?
The U.S. Census Bureau conducts more than 130 surveys each year, including our nation’s largest household survey, the American Community Survey. The top 5 household surveys are listed below. To find more information on a specific survey you received please select it from the list of household surveys below.
What is an ongoing survey?
An ongoing survey that provides data every year -- giving communities the current information they need to plan investments and services.
How often is the National Crime Victimization Survey conducted?
National Census Bureau Survey. This ongoing survey is conducted approximately four times a year to study a variety of new methods and technologies under consideration for the 2020 Census. National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) Data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau.
What is the Household Pulse Survey?
The Household Pulse Survey is designed to deploy quickly and efficiently, collecting data to measure household experiences during the coronavirus pandemic. Data will be disseminated in near real-time to inform federal and state response and recovery planning.
When will Data be Made Available from the Household Pulse Survey?
Data collection for Phase 3.3 of the Household Pulse Survey started on December 1, 2021 and is scheduled to continue until February 7, 2022.
What is the pulse survey?
Census Bureau, in collaboration with multiple federal agencies, is in a unique position to produce data on the social and economic effects of coronavirus on American households. The Household Pulse Survey is designed to deploy quickly and efficiently, collecting data to measure household experiences ...
When did Phase 3.1 of the Household Pulse Survey end?
Data collection for Phase 3.1 of the Household Pulse Survey began on April 14, 2021 and ended on July 5, 2021.
Is the Census Bureau a pulse survey?
The Census Bureau is fielding the Household Pulse Survey as a part of the agency’s Experimental Data Series; as such, data products may not meet some of the Census Bureau’s statistical quality standards. Data are subject to suppression based on overall response and disclosure avoidance thresholds.
How to adjust household survey employment?
The process to adjust household survey employment begins with the official household survey employment estimate and removes categories of workers not included in the payroll survey by subtracting agriculture and related employment, the nonagricultural self-employed, unpaid workers in family businesses, workers in private households, and workers on unpaid leave from their jobs. Then, to roughly adjust household survey employment from an employed people concept to a jobs concept, adds the number of nonagricultural wage and salary multiple jobholders. (More information about the adjusted research series is in the Appendix .)
Why is the household survey higher than the payroll survey?
In the chart, the household survey employment level (the red line) is higher than that of the payroll survey (the orange line) because the household survey has a broader employment definition than the payroll survey. See the Comparison of survey concepts, definitions, and methodologies section below for information about differences in the surveys' employment definitions.
What is the estimate of employed people?
Estimate of employed people (multiple jobholders are counted only once). Includes people on unpaid leave from their jobs. Estimate of jobs (multiple jobholders are counted for each nonfarm payroll job). Includes only people who received pay for the reference pay period.
What is a CPS survey?
The household survey (CPS) is designed to measure the labor force status of the civilian noninstitutional population with demographic detail. The national unemployment rate is the best-known statistic produced from the household survey. The survey also provides a measure of employed people, one that includes agricultural workers and the self-employed. A representative sample of U.S. households provides the information for the household survey.
When did the BLS update the household survey?
Effective January 4, 2019 , BLS revised the entire adjusted household survey employment research series to remove the smoothings and to re-run seasonal adjustment. At the same time, the official household survey employment series replaced the smoothed household survey employment research series previously shown in the chart.
Why are both surveys needed?
Both surveys are needed for a complete picture of the labor market.
Do household and payroll surveys track well over the long term?
Although the household and payroll survey employment measures track well over the long term, periodic divergences occur.
How was I selected to be in this survey?
The Census Bureau randomly chose your address, not you personally, to participate in this survey. A limited number of addresses from across the country were scientifically selected to represent the entire population.
Who is conducting this survey? How will my responses be used?
The Census Bureau is the designated federal statistic al agency conducting this survey.
When will phase 3.2 of the Household Pulse Survey be released?
Data collection for Phase 3.2 of the survey is scheduled to begin on July 21, 2021, with the next data release on August 11, 2021. The Household Pulse Survey is a 20-minute online survey studying how the coronavirus pandemic is impacting households across the country from a social and economic perspective. The survey asks questions about how ...
What is the purpose of participation in the federal government survey?
Your participation will help federal and state officials direct aid, assistance, and support to the people and places that need it most. This survey provides information that cannot be collected elsewhere. Your response is key.
What questions are asked in the stimulus survey?
The survey asks questions about how childcare, education, employment, food security, health, housing, social security benefits, household spending, consumer spending associated with stimulus payments, intention to receive a COVID-19 vaccination, and transportation have been affected by the ongoing crisis.
Can only those whose addresses have been selected to participate in the Household Pulse Survey?
Only those whose addresses have been selected to participate can complete the survey. A limited number of addresses across the country have been invited to answer the Household Pulse Survey.
Can a household address replace a participant's response?
Your participation is important, and your response cannot be replaced by one from another household address.
What are the differences between household and establishment surveys?
Here, during recessions, the Establishment survey will show job losses as recessionary conditions take hold and workers are laid off , while the Household survey will show gains as those displaced workers move into the kind of marginal employment that is captured by that survey.
How old do you have to be to take a household survey?
The household survey is limited to workers 16 years of age and older. The establishment survey is not limited by age.
