Household Income and Expenditure Survey Analysis Report

2005 Household Income and Expenditure Survey ReportOne outlier was identified during the data editing phase and as a result the weight for this householdwas set to 1. The weights for the remaining households within that stratum were adjusted accordingly.2.4. Recruitment, Training and EnumerationSurvey workers were recruited from the college, who were going back to their resident states for thesummer. Competent enumerators in previous surveys were also contacted and rehired if they wereinterested. All candidates were tested for competency (English language, following instructions, etc).Training of enumerators and supervisors were carried out in the states 1 to 2 weeks before the surveyreference date (June 1, 2005). A verbatim training guide was used in the training to ensure uniformunderstanding of procedures. Field-practice interviewing, a key part of the training process, was notcarried out due to miscommunication. The DoS Branch Office managers in the states oversee thesurvey operations in each of the states. Selected staff from the national office was relocated to Pohnpeiand Chuuk to assist in overseeing the project because of the short-staffing in these at the time of thesurvey.2.5. Data ProcessingThe CSPro software was used for the data entry of the survey. The forms were keyed at the branchoffice with the exception of Chuuk. Due to the frequent power outages in Chuuk, its forms wereshipped to Pohnpei for keying. Fifty percent of the questionnaires were verified or re-keyed to ensuredata-entry quality. No computer consistency edit checks were run against the data during thekeying/verification process since the programs for these processes were not available at the time.Data quality checks and edits were done at the US Bureau of Census. Further edits were applied to thedata during the data analysis and report writing process.2.6. Limitation of DataAs with any sample survey of this nature, results produced in this report will be subjected to bothsampling and non-sampling error.• Sampling Error: The error associated with collecting information from only a sample of unitsfrom the population instead of enumerating everyone• Non-sampling Error: All other errors associated with the final resultsIssues which contribute to the non-sampling errors in the survey include questionnaire design flaws,data reporting errors and data entry errors to name a few. Every effort was made to keep such errors toa minimum during the conduct of the survey.Moreover, considering that both cash and non-cash expenditures and income are gathered in the HIES,valuation of non-cash income and expenditure may pose some problems. The instructions are to usemarket prices prevailing in the locality for goods received as gifts and farm gate prices for goodsconsumed from home production activities.2.7. Data classifications and presentationThe HIES commodities were manually coded using a non-standard three-digit classification used in the1998 HIES. During the computer editing process, these codes were converted to a non-standard 7-digitclassification loosely based on the US Bureau of Labor Statistics classification.The questionnaire design of the 2005 HIES vary from that of the 1998 HIES rendering comparison ofthe data to the 2005 HIES limited. However, when the data permits, comparisons will be made.The income and expenditure values presented herein are in nominal terms.Division of Statistics,Office of Statistics, Budget & Economic Management, Overseas Development Assistance and Compact Management 3