Luxembourg stands out as the European leader in quality of life for 2025, achieving a score of 220 on the Quality of Life Index. The Netherlands follows closely behind with 211 points, while Albania and Ukraine rank at the bottom with scores of 104 and 115 respectively. This index provides a thorough assessment of living conditions across Europe, reflecting various factors that shape the overall well-being of populations and extending beyond purely economic metrics. Understanding the quality of life index The quality of life index is a multifaceted measure that incorporates factors such as purchasing power, pollution levels, housing affordability, cost of living, safety, healthcare quality, traffic conditions, and climate, to measure the overall quality of life of a Country. Higher overall index scores indicate better living conditions. However, in subindexes such as pollution, cost of living, and traffic commute time, lower values correspond to improved quality of life. Challenges affecting life satisfaction Despite the fact that European countries register high levels of life quality by for example leading the ranking of happiest countries in the world, life satisfaction across the European Union has been on a downward trend since 2018. The EU's overall life satisfaction score dropped from 7.3 out of 10 in 2018 to 7.1 in 2022. This decline can be attributed to various factors, including the COVID-19 pandemic and economic challenges such as high inflation. Rising housing costs, in particular, have emerged as a critical concern, significantly affecting quality of life. This issue has played a central role in shaping voter priorities for the European Parliamentary Elections in 2024 and becoming one of the most pressing challenges for Europeans, profoundly influencing both daily experiences and long-term well-being.

About the Dataset

This dataset contains Quality of Life indices for various countries around the globe, extracted from the Numbeo website. The data provides valuable metrics for comparing countries based on several aspects of living standards, which can assist in decisions such as choosing a place to live or analyzing global trends in quality of life.

OBS: The code to generate this dataset is presented on: https://www.kaggle.com/code/marcelobatalhah/web-scrapping-quality-of-life-index

Columns in the Dataset

1. Rank:
   The global rank of the country based on its Quality of Life Index according to Year (1 = highest quality of life).

2. Country:
   The name of the country.

3. Quality of Life Index:
   A composite index that evaluates the overall quality of life in a country by combining other indices, such as Safety, Purchasing Power, and Health Care.

4. Purchasing Power Index:
   Measures the relative purchasing power of the average consumer in a country compared to New York City (baseline = 100).

5. Safety Index:
   Indicates the safety level of a country. A higher score suggests a safer environment.

6. Health Care Index:
   Evaluates the quality and accessibility of healthcare in the country.

7. Cost of Living Index:
   Measures the relative cost of living in a country compared to New York City (baseline = 100).

8. Property Price to Income Ratio:
   Compares the affordability of real estate by dividing the average property price by the average income.

9. Traffic Commute Time Index:
   Reflects the average time spent commuting due to traffic.

10. Pollution Index:
    Rates the level of pollution in the country (air, water, etc.).

11. Climate Index:
    Rates the favorability of the climate in the country (higher = more favorable).

12. Year:
    Year when the metrics were extracted.

Key Insights from the Dataset

• The Quality of Life Index aggregates multiple indicators, making it a useful single metric to compare countries.
• Specific indices such as Safety Index or Health Care Index allow for focused analysis on areas like security or healthcare quality.
• Cost of Living Index and Purchasing Power Index can help determine the affordability of living in each country.

How the Data Was Collected

• The dataset was built using web scraping techniques in Python.
• The data was extracted from the "Quality of Life Rankings by Country" page on Numbeo.
• Libraries used:
  • requests for retrieving webpage content.
  • BeautifulSoup for parsing the HTML and extracting relevant information.
  • pandas for organizing and storing the data in a structured format.

Possible Applications

1. Relocation Decision Making:
   Use the dataset to compare countries and identify destinations with high quality of life, safety, and healthcare.

2. Global Analysis:
   Perform exploratory data analysis (EDA) to identify trends and correlations across quality of life metrics.

3. Visualization:
   Plot global maps, bar charts, or other visualizations to better understand the data.

4. Predictive Modeling:
   Use this dataset as a base for machine learning tasks, like predicting Quality of Life Index based on other metrics.

Abstract

Timor-Leste experienced a fundamental social and economic upheaval after its people voted for independence from Indonesia in a referendum in August 1999. Population was displaced, and public and private infrastructure was destroyed or rendered inoperable. Soon after the violence ceased, the country began rebuilding itself with the support from UN agencies, the international donor community and NGOs. The government laid out a National Development Plan (NDP) with two central goals: to promote rapid, equitable and sustainable economic growth and to reduce poverty.

Formulating a national plan and poverty reduction strategy required data on poverty and living standards, and given the profound changes experienced, new data collection had to be undertaken to accurately assess the living conditions in the country. The Planning Commission of the Timor-Leste Transitional Authority undertook a Poverty Assessment Project along with the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the United Nations Development Programme and the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA).

This project comprised three data collection activities on different aspects of living standards, which taken together, provide a comprehensive picture of well-being in Timor-Leste. The first component was the Suco Survey, which is a census of all 498 sucos (villages) in the country. It provides an inventory of existing social and physical infrastructure and of the economic characteristics of each suco, in addition to aldeia (hamlet) level population figures. It was carried out between February and April 2001.

A second element was the Timor-Leste Living Standards Measurement Survey (TLSS). This is a household survey with a nationally representative sample of 1,800 families from 100 sucos. It was designed to diagnose the extent, nature and causes of poverty, and to analyze policy options facing the country. It assembles comprehensive information on household demographics, housing and assets, household expenditures and some components of income, agriculture, labor market data, basic health and education, subjective perceptions of poverty and social capital.

Data collection was undertaken between end August and November 2001.

The final component was the Participatory Potential Assessment (PPA), which is a qualitative community survey in 48 aldeias in the 13 districts of the country to take stock of their assets, skills and strengths, identify the main challenges and priorities, and formulate strategies for tackling these within their communities. It was completed between November 2001 and January 2002.

Geographic coverage

National coverage. Domains: Urban/rural; Agro-ecological zones (Highlands, Lowlands, Western Region, Eastern Region, Central Region)

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

SAMPLE SIZE AND ANALYTIC DOMAINS

A survey relies on identifying a subgroup of a population that is representative both for the underlying population and for specific analytical domains of interest. The main objective of the TLSS is to derive a poverty profile for the country and salient population groups. The fundamental analytic domains identified are the Major Urban Centers (Dili and Baucau), the Other Urban Centers and the Rural Areas. The survey represents certain important sub-divisions of the Rural Areas, namely two major agro-ecologic zones (Lowlands and Highlands) and three broad geographic regions (West, Center and East). In addition to these domains, we can separate landlocked sucos (Inland) from those with sea access (Coast), and generate categories merging rural and urban strata along the geographic, altitude, and sea access dimensions. However, the TLSS does not provide detailed indicators for narrow geographic areas, such as postos or even districts. [Note: Timor-Leste is divided into 13 major units called districts. These are further subdivided into 67 postos (subdistricts), 498 sucos (villages) and 2,336 aldeias (sub-villages). The administrative structure is uniform throughout the country, including rural and urban areas.]

The survey has a sample size of 1,800 households, or about one percent of the total number of households in Timor-Leste. The experience of Living Standards Measurement Surveys in many countries - most of them substantially larger than Timor-Leste - has shown that samples of that size are sufficient for the requirements of a poverty assessment.

The survey domains were defined as follows. The Urban Area is divided into the Major Urban Centers (the 31 sucos in Dili and the 6 sucos in Baucau) and the Other Urban Centers (the remaining 34 urban sucos outside Dili and Baucau). The rest of the country (427 sucos in total) comprises the Rural Area. The grouping of sucos into urban and rural areas is based on the Indonesian classification. In addition, we separated rural sucos both by agro-ecological zones and geographic areas. With the help of the Geographic Information System developed at the Department of Agriculture, sucos were subsequently qualified as belonging to the Highlands or the Lowlands depending on the share of their surface above and below the 500 m level curve. The three westernmost districts (Oecussi, Bobonaro and Cova Lima) constitute the Western Region, the three easternmost districts (Baucau, Lautem and Viqueque) the Eastern Region, and the remaining seven districts (Aileu, Ainaro, Dili, Ermera, Liquica, Manufahi and Manatuto) belong to the Central Region.

SAMPLING STRATA AND SAMPLE ALLOCATION

Our next step was to ensure that each analytical domain contained a sufficient number of households. Assuming a uniform sampling fraction of approximately 1/100, a non-stratified 1,800-household sample would contain around 240 Major Urban households and 170 Other Urban households -too few to sustain representative and significant analyses. We therefore stratified the sample to separate the two urban areas from the rural areas. The rural strata were large enough so that its implicit stratification along agro-ecological and geographical dimensions was sufficient to ensure that these dimensions were represented proportionally to their share of the population. The final sample design by strata was as follows: 450 households in the Major Urban Centers (378 in Dili and 72 in Baucau), 252 households in the Other Urban Centers and 1,098 households in the Rural Areas.

SAMPLING STRATEGY

The sampling of households in each stratum, with the exception of Urban Dili, followed a 3-stage procedure. In the first stage, a certain number of sucos were selected with probability proportional to size (PPS). Hence 4 sucos were selected in Urban Baucau, 14 in Other Urban Centers and 61 in the Rural Areas. In the second stage, 3 aldeias in each suco were selected, again with probability proportional to size (PPS). In the third stage, 6 households were selected in each aldeia with equal probability (EP). This implies that the sample is approximately selfweighted within the stratum: all households in the stratum had the same chance of being visited by the survey.

A simpler and more efficient 2-stage process was used for Urban Dili. In the first stage, 63 aldeias were selected with PPS and in the second stage 6 households with equal probability in each aldeia (for a total sample of 378 households). This procedure reduces sampling errors since the sample will be spread more than with the standard 3-stage process, but it can only be applied to Urban Dili as only there it was possible to sort the selected aldeias into groups of 3 aldeias located in close proximity of each other.

HOUSEHOLD LISTING

The final sampling stage requires choosing a certain number of households at random with equal probability in each of the aldeias selected by the previous sampling stages. This requires establishing the complete inventory of all households in these aldeias - a field task known as the household listing operation. The household listing operation also acquires importance as a benchmark for assessing the quality of the population data collected by the Suco Survey, which was conducted in February-March 2001. At that time, the number of households currently living in each aldeia was asked from the suco and aldeia chiefs, but there are reasons to suspect that these figures are biased. Specifically, certain suco and aldeia chiefs may have answered about households belonging, rather than currently living, in the aldeias, whereas others may have faced perverse incentives to report figures different from the actual ones. These biases are believed to be more serious in Dili than in the rest of the country.

Two operational approaches were considered for the household listing. One is the classical doorto-door (DTD) method that is generally used in most countries for this kind of operations. The second approach - which is specific of Timor-Leste - depends on the lists of families that are kept by most suco and aldeia chiefs in their offices. The prior-list-dependent (PLD) method is much faster, since it can be completed by a single enumerator in each aldeia, working most of the time in the premises of the suco or aldeia chief; however, it can be prone to biases depending on the accuracy and timeliness of the family lists.

After extensive empirical testing of the weaknesses and strengths of the two alternatives, we decided to use the DTD method in Dili and an improved version of the PLD method elsewhere. The improvements introduced to the PLD consisted in clarifying the concept of a household "currently living in the aldeia", both by intensive training and supervision of the enumerators and by making its meaning explicit in the form's wording (it means that the household members are regularly eating and sleeping in the aldeia at the time of the operation). In addition,

Abstract

Over the past decade, Albania has been seeking to develop the framework for a market economy and more open society. It has faced severe internal and external challenges in the interim – extremely low income levels and a lack of basic infrastructure, the rapid collapse of output and inflation rise after the shift in regime in 1991, the turmoil during the 1997 pyramid crisis, and the social and economic shocks accompanying the 1999 Kosovo crisis. In the face of these challenges, Albania has made notable progress in creating conditions conducive to growth and poverty reduction.

In the process leading to its first Poverty Reduction Strategy (that is the National Strategy for Socioeconomic Development, now renamed the National Strategy for Development and Integration), the Government of Albania reinforced its commitment to strengthening its own capacity to collect and analyze on a regular basis the information it needs to inform policy-making.

Multi-purpose household surveys are one of the main sources of information to determine living conditions and measure the poverty situation of a country. They provide an indispensable tool to assist policy-makers in monitoring and targeting social programs. In its first phase (2001-2006), this monitoring system included the following data collection instruments: (i) Population and Housing Census; (ii) Living Standards Measurement Surveys every 3 years, and (iii) annual panel surveys.

The Population and Housing Census (PHC) conducted in April 2001, provided the country with a much needed updated sampling frame which is one of the building blocks for the household survey structure. The focus during this first phase of the monitoring system is on a periodic LSMS (in 2002 and 2005), followed by panel surveys on a subsample of LSMS households (in 2003, and 2004), drawing heavily on the 2001 census information.

A poverty profile based on 2002 data showed that some 25 percent of the population are poor, with many others vulnerable to poverty due to their incomes being close to the poverty threshold. Income related poverty is compounded by poor access to basic infrastructure (regular supply of electricity, clean water), education and health services, housing, etc.

The 2005 LSMS was in the field between May and early July, with an additional visit to agricultural households in October, 2005. The survey work was undertaken by the Living Standards unit of INSTAT, with the technical assistance of the World Bank.

Geographic coverage

National coverage. Domains: Tirana, other urban, rural; Agro-ecological areas (coastal, central, mountain)

Analysis unit

• Households
• Individuals

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

The Republic of Albania is divided geographically into 12 Prefectures (Prefekturat). The latter are divided into Districts (Rrethet) which are, in turn, divided into Cities (Qyteti) and Communes (Komunat). The Communes contain all the rural villages and the very small cities. For census purposes, the cities and the villages have been divided into enumeration areas (EAs).

1. Sampling frame

The Enumeration Areas (EA) that make up the sampling frame come from the April 2001 General Census of Population and Housing. The EAs in the frame are classified by Prefecture, District, City or Commune. The frame also contains, for every EA, the number of Housing Units (HU), the number of occupied HUs, the number of unoccupied HUs, the number of households, and the population. We are using occupied dwellings and not total number of dwellings since many EAs contain a large number of empty dwellings.

A detailed study of the list of census EAs shows that many have zero population. In order to obtain EAs with the minimum of 50 and the maximum of 120 occupied housing units, the EAs with zero population have been taken off the sampling frame. Since the sizes of the EAs varied from 0 to 395 HUs, the smaller EAs (with less than 50 HU) have been collapsed with geographically adjacent ones and the largest EAs (with more than 120 HU) have been split into two or more EAs. Subsequently, maps identifying the boundaries of every split and collapsed EA were prepared. Given that the 2002 LSMS has been conducted less than a year after the April 2001 census, a listing operation to update the sample EAs was not conducted in the field. However, since the level of construction is very high in the city of Tirana and its suburbs, a quick count of the 75 sample EAs selected in Tirana was carried out followed by a listing operation. The check of the listing based on the Census data revealed two types of discrepancies: - HUs had become invalid, i.e. vacant, nonresidential, demolished, seasonally occupied, etc. - Instead of one small building (with one or two HU), a new one with 15 HUs was identified.

During of the listing update process, HUs identified as invalid were taken off the frame. In the case of a new building, these new HUs were entered with a new sequential code. The listing sheets prepared during the listing operation in Tirana, become the sampling frame for the final stage of selection of 12 HU which has to be interviewed. The unit of analysis and the unit of observation is the household. The universe under study consists of all the households in the Republic of Albania. We have used the Housing Unit (defined as the space occupied by one household) as the sampling unit, instead of the household, because the HU is more permanent and easier to identify in the field.

1. Sample Size

In the LSMS the sample size is 450 EA and in each EA 8 households were selected. So the total sample size of the LSMS is 3600 households. In addition, since a certain level of nonresponse is expected, 4 reserve units were selected in each sample EA.

1. Stratification

The sampling frame has been divided in three regions (strata) 1. Coastal Area 2. Central Area 3. Mountain Area and Tirana (urban and other urban) is consider as a separate strata.

The first three strata were divided into major cities (the most important cities in the region), other urban (the rest of cities in the region), and rural. In each more importance was given to the major cities and rural areas. We have selected 10 EA for each major city and 65 EAs (75 EAs for Mountain Area) for each region. In the city of Tirana and its suburbs, implicit stratification was used to improve the efficiency of the sample design.

1. Procedure for the Selection of Housing Units

A fixed number of valid dwelling units (12) was selected systematically and with equal probability from the Listing Form pertaining to Tirana and from the Census forms for the other areas. Once the 12 HUs were selected, 4 of them were chosen at random and kept as reserve units. The selected HUs were numbered within the EA and identified with a circle around the number in the listing form, as well as a circle on the maps. The reserve sample (units 9 to 12) were identified from R1 to R4 during data collection to emphasize the fact that they were reserve units.

Two copies of the sample listing sheets and two copies of maps for each EA were printed. The first copy of the listing sheet and the map were given to the supervisor and included the 12 HU, the second copy was given to the enumerator. The enumerator only received the 8 dwelling units, not the reserve ones. Each time the enumerator needed a reserve HU, he/she had to ask the supervisor and explain the reason why a reserve unit was needed. This process helped determine the reason why reserve units were used and provided more control on their use.

In the field the enumerator registered the occupancy status of every unit: - occupied as principal residence - vacant - under construction (not occupied) - demolished or abandoned (not occupied) - seasonally occupied

In the case that one HU was found to be invalid, the enumerator used the first reserve unit (identified with the code R1). In the case that in one EA more than 4 DU selected were invalid, other units from that EA chosen at random by headquarter (in Tirana) were selected as replacement units to keep the enumerator load constant and maintain a uniform sample size in each EA. Before identifying the invalid HUs, the interviewer had to note the interview status of each visit for all the units for which an interview was attempted, whether these are original units or reserve units. This was done to determine the interview status: interview completed, nonresponse, refusal, etc. In other words, this will allow identifying: the completed interviews (responses obtained), the incomplete but usable ones (responses obtained), the incomplete ones but not usable (nonresponse), the refusals (nonresponse) and the "not at home" (nonresponse). Subsequently, the invalid units identified were substituted with the available reserves, always maintaining the sample of 8 HUs.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument

Four survey instruments were used to collect information for the 2005 Albania LSMS: a household questionnaire, a diary for recording household food consumption, a community questionnaire, and a price questionnaire.

The household questionnaire included all the core LSMS modules as defined in Grosh and Glewwe (2000)1, plus additional modules on migration, fertility, subjective poverty, agriculture, non-farm enterprises, and social capital. Geographical referencing data on the longitude and latitude of each household were also recorded using portable GPS devices. Geo-referencing will enable a more efficient spatial link among the different surveys of the system, as well as between the survey households and other geo-referenced information.

The choice of the modules was aimed at matching as much as

Abstract

The Côte d'Ivoire Living Standards Survey (LSS) was the first LSMS Survey to have field tested the methodology and questionnaire developed by LSMS. It consists of three complementary surveys: the household survey, the community survey and the price survey. The household survey collected detailed information on expenditures, income, employment, assets, basic needs and other socio-economic characteristics of the households. The Community Survey collected information on economic and demographic characteristics of the rural communities to which each cluster of households belonged. This was designed to enable the linkage of community level with household level data. The price survey component of the CILSS collected data on prices at the nearest market to each cluster of households, so that regional price indices could be constructed for the household survey. The Côte d'Ivoire Living Standards Survey (LSS) was undertaken over a period of four years, 1985-88, by the Direction de la Statistique in Côte d'Ivoire, with financial and technical support from the World Bank during the first two years of the survey. It was the first year-round household survey to have been undertaken by the Ivorian Direction de la Statistique. The sample size each year was 1600 households and the sample design was a rotating panel. That is, half of the households were revisited the following year, while the other half were replaced with new households. The survey thus produced four cross-sectional data sets as well as three overlapping panels of 800 households each (1985-86, 1986-87, 1987-88).

Geographic coverage

National

Analysis unit

Households

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

(a) SAMPLE DESIGN The principal objective of the sample selection process for the LSS Household Survey was to obtain a nationally representative cross-section of African households, some of which could be interviewed in successive years as panel households. A two-stage sampling procedure was used. In the first stage, 100 Primary Sampling Units (PSUs) were selected across the country from a list of all PSUs available in the sampling frame. At the second stage, a cluster of 16 households was selected within each PSU. This led to a sample size of 1600 households a year, in 100 cluster s of 16 households each. Half of the households were replaced each year while the other half (the panel households in 1986, 1987 and 1988) were interviewed a second time. It is important to note that there was a change in the sampling procedures (the sampling frame, PSU selection process and listing procedures), used to select half of the clusters/households interviewed in 1987 (the other half were panel households retained from 1986), and all of the clusters/households interviewed in 1988. Households selected on the basis of the first set of sampling procedures will henceforth be referred to as Block 1 data while households based on the second set of sampling procedures will be referred to as Block 2 data.

(b) SAMPLE FRAME 1. Sampling Procedures for Block 1 Data The Sampling Frame. The sampling frame for the 1985, 1986, and half of the 1987 samples (except for Abidjan and Bouaké) was a list of localities constructed on the basis of the 1975 Census, updated to 1983 by the demographers of the Direction de la Statistique and based on a total population estimated at 9.4 million in 1983.The Block 1 frame for Abidjan and Bouaké was based on data from a 1979-80 electoral census of these two cities. The electoral census had produced detailed maps of the two cities that divided each sector of the city into smaller sub-sectors (îlots). Sub-sectors with similar types of housing were grouped together by statisticians in the Direction de la Statistique to form PSUs. From a list of all PSUs in each city, along with each PSU's population size, the required number of PSUs were selected using a systematic sampling procedure. The step size was equal to the city's population divided by the number of PSUs required in each city. One problem identified in the selection process for Abidjan arose from the fact that one sector of the city (Yopougon) which had been relatively small in 1980 at the time of the electoral census, had since become the largest agglomeration in Côte d'Ivoire. This problem was presumably unavoidable since accurate population data for Yopougon was not available at the time of the PSU selection process.

Selection of PSUs. Geographic stratification was not explicitly needed because the systematic sampling procedure that was used to select the PSUs ensured that the sample was balanced with respect to region and by site type, within each region. The main geographical regions defined were: East Forest, West Forest, and Savannah. Site types varied as follows: large cities, towns, large and small villages, surrounding towns, village centers, and villages attached to them. The 100 PSUs were selected, with probabilities proportional to the size of their population, from a list of PSUs sorted by region and within each region, by site type. Selection of households within each PSU. A pre-survey was conducted in June-July of 1984, to establish the second-stage sampling frame, i.e. a list of households for each PSU from which 16 households could be selected. The same listing exercise was to be used for both the 1985 and 1986 surveys, in order to avoid having to conduct another costly pre-survey in the second year. Thus, the 1984 pre-survey had to provide enough households so as to be able to select two clusters of households in each PSU and to allow for replacement households in the event that some in the sample could not be contacted or refused to participate. A listing of 64 households in each PSU met this requirement. In PSUs with 64 households or fewer, every household was listed. In selecting the households, the "step" used was equal to the estimated number of households in the PSU divided by 64. For example, if the PSU had an estimated 640 households, then every tenth household was included in the listing, counted from a random starting point in the PSU. For operational reasons, the maximum step allowable was a step of 30. In practice, it appears that enumerators used doors, instead of housing structures, in counting the step. Al though enumerators were supposed to start the listing process from a random point in the PSU, in rural areas and small towns, reportedly, the lister started from the center of the PSU.

1. Sampling Procedures for Block 2 Data

The Sampling Frame. The sampling frame for Block 2 data was established from a list of places from the results of the Census of inhabited sites (RSH) performed in preparation for the 1988 Population Census. Selection of PSUs. The PSUs were selected with probability proportional to size. However, in order to save what might have been exorbitant costs of listing every household in each selected PSU in a pre-survey, the Direction de la Statistique made a decision to enumerate a smaller unit within each PSU. The area within each PSU was divided into smaller blocks called `îlots'. Households were then selected from a randomly chosen îlot within each PSU. The sample îlot was selected with equal probability within each PSU, not on the basis of probability proportional to size. (These îlots are reportedly relatively small compared with the size of PSUs selected for the Block 1 frame, but no further information is available about their geographical position within the PSUs.) Selection of households within each PSU. All households in each îlot selected for the Block 2 sample were listed. Sixteen households were then randomly chosen from the list of households for each îlot.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Cleaning operations

The Household Questionnaire was almost entirely pre-coded, thus reducing errors involved in the coding process. Also, the decentralized data entry system allowed for immediate follow-up on inconsistencies that were detected by the data entry program. Household and personal identification codes were recorded in each section, facilitating merging data across sections

Sampling error estimates

(a) ACCURACY The general consensus is that the quality of the LSS household data is very good. An informal review of data quality conducted by Ainsworth and Mehra (1988) assessed the 1985 and 1986 LSS data in terms of their accuracy, completeness, and internal consistency. The LSS household data were found to score high marks on each of these three counts. One measure of data quality is the extent to which individuals in question respond for themselves during the interview, rather than having proxy responses provided for them by other household members. The investigation of CILSS household survey data for 1985 and 1986 showed that 93 percent of women responded for themselves to the fertility section and that 79 to 80 percent of all adult household members responded for themselves to the employment module. The percent of children responding for themselves to the employment module was far less, 43 to 45 percent. Nevertheless, these rates were found to be higher than for the Peru Living Standards Survey (29 percent).

(b) COMPLETENESS

Investigation of several variables and modules in the LSS (sex, age, parental characteristics, schooling, health, employment, migration, fertility, farming and family business), found that missing data in the household survey are rare. Rates for missing data were found to be close to 0 (0.01 to 0.05 percent) in many cases, but in any case, no higher than 0.76 percent.

Hungary, Czechia, Poland, and Portugal were the countries in Europe where house prices increased the most between 2015 and 2024. The EMF house price index for all four countries measured more than 200 index points, indicating that home prices more than doubled since 2015 — the base year. Property prices are tightly connected with the supply of new homes. France, Poland, and Denmark are some of the countries with the most dwellings completed per 1,000 citizens in Europe.

The average for 2021 based on 41 countries was 107.05 index points. The highest value was in Switzerland: 211.98 index points and the lowest value was in Belarus: 40.99 index points. The indicator is available from 2017 to 2021. Below is a chart for all countries where data are available.

Abstract

The Living Standards Measurement Study (LSMS) is a household survey program focused on generating high-quality data, improving survey methods, and building capacity. The goal of the LSMS is to facilitate the use of household survey data for evidence-based policymaking. The aim of this survey was to select objective, representative and as far as possible, total information, which would enable users to draw up a picture of the actual status of living standards of the population of the Republic of Kazakhstan. This information should be the basis for the assessment of efficiency of Government Economic and Social refprms, and should assist in the application of specific levels of social protection.

Geographic coverage

The whole country.

Analysis unit

• Households
• Individuals
• Municipal

Universe

The main resources of information concerning social and economic indicators of living standard of population of the Republic of Kazakhstan are 6000 households which represent a republican network. The survey LSMS carried was a cultipurpose probability sample which covered 2000 households of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

A Sample designed for LSMS had to assist to:

• Reflect the realistic picture of social and territorial distribution of the population in the Republic of kazakhstan;
• Compare the outcome of LSMS in Kazakhstan with the results of LSMS in other countries, which were performed basedon possible sample principals;

Data was presented in total for all Kazakhstan (linear distribution of answers) and in different samples according to the purposes of the survey. Grouping of data within Oblasts ensures maximu interest. We did not however carry out an analysis in Oblast sample, since sub-groups which had been defined as a result did not obtain enough volume for representative conclusions. Alternatively we administered a territory (regional) sample through merging several Oblasts within regions. data has been analyses in seven samples in accordance with the purposes of the survey and the wishes of our partners:

• Sampling according to types of settlement;
• Territory sample;
• Sex sample;
• Age sample;
• Sample on household size
• Sample according to household type;
• Sample according to average per capita monthly income%.

Sampling deviation

To create a basis to design , a probability sample GOSCOMSTAT and its oblast branches in May 1996 have delivered the most actual numerical material concerning population (01-01-1996). it contains the following information:

• A list of all 2'534 agricultural regions without exeption with the measurement of their quantity (number of households and number of inhabitants). This data has been received from rural administrations where total registration is carried out;
• A list of all 263 villages, small and middle-size cities without exeption with the measurement of their quantity (number of households and number of inhabitants). This data has been receinved from village councils and from house administrations bodies for the cities where the total registration is carried out.
• A list of all 24 large citiess without exeption with the measurement of their size (number of households and number of inhabitants). This data has been receinved from house administrations bodies (eg: technical inventory Bureau, house administrations, Cooperatives, Street Committees, Brach Agencies and Dormitories).

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument

The questionnaire has been designed in the following stages:

• Family Questionnaire contains the questions which relate to all households in general and consist of following sections: Information about a family card, living standard, agriculture and cattée-breeding, expenditures/consumption, incomes;
• Individuals Questionnaire contains questions which relate to each member of a family and consists of the followingsections: General information/migration, education, care of children, employment status, work, medical services, health assessment, for women, time budget, anthropometrical measurements.
• Community Questionnaire consist of the following sections: Demographical information, economy and infrastructure, agriculture, education and health care Price Questionnaire that was designed as a separate section to Community Questionnaire. the information concerning 21 items of the most important nutrition products has been selected in it. Price were to be surveyed if possible in three different sale units (shops, markets, kiosks) of this populated area. however, interviewers were able to find in many villages, only working shop.

Response rate

Regarding the Individual Questionnaire, out of 7'223 interviewed persons, 6'955 permanently live in their households (96.3%) and 130 (1.8%) are living inside the most part of their time and 65 (0.9%) oftener living in other places.

Abstract

In 1992, Bosnia-Herzegovina, one of the six republics in former Yugoslavia, became an independent nation. A civil war started soon thereafter, lasting until 1995 and causing widespread destruction and losses of lives. Following the Dayton accord, BosniaHerzegovina (BiH) emerged as an independent state comprised of two entities, namely, the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina (FBiH) and the Republika Srpska (RS), and the district of Brcko. In addition to the destruction caused to the physical infrastructure, there was considerable social disruption and decline in living standards for a large section of the population. Along side these events, a period of economic transition to a market economy was occurring. The distributive impacts of this transition, both positive and negative, are unknown. In short, while it is clear that welfare levels have changed, there is very little information on poverty and social indicators on which to base policies and programs.

In the post-war process of rebuilding the economic and social base of the country, the government has faced the problems created by having little relevant data at the household level. The three statistical organizations in the country (State Agency for Statistics for BiH –BHAS, the RS Institute of Statistics-RSIS, and the FBiH Institute of Statistics-FIS) have been active in working to improve the data available to policy makers: both at the macro and the household level. One facet of their activities is to design and implement a series of household series. The first of these surveys is the Living Standards Measurement Study survey (LSMS). Later surveys will include the Household Budget Survey (an Income and Expenditure Survey) and a Labor Force Survey. A subset of the LSMS households will be re-interviewed in the two years following the LSMS to create a panel data set.

The three statistical organizations began work on the design of the Living Standards Measurement Study Survey (LSMS) in 1999. The purpose of the survey was to collect data needed for assessing the living standards of the population and for providing the key indicators needed for social and economic policy formulation. The survey was to provide data at the country and the entity level and to allow valid comparisons between entities to be made.

The LSMS survey was carried out in the Fall of 2001 by the three statistical organizations with financial and technical support from the Department for International Development of the British Government (DfID), United Nations Development Program (UNDP), the Japanese Government, and the World Bank (WB). The creation of a Master Sample for the survey was supported by the Swedish Government through SIDA, the European Commission, the Department for International Development of the British Government and the World Bank.

The overall management of the project was carried out by the Steering Board, comprised of the Directors of the RS and FBiH Statistical Institutes, the Management Board of the State Agency for Statistics and representatives from DfID, UNDP and the WB. The day-to-day project activities were carried out by the Survey Mangement Team, made up of two professionals from each of the three statistical organizations.

The Living Standard Measurement Survey LSMS, in addition to collecting the information necessary to obtain a comprehensive as possible measure of the basic dimensions of household living standards, has three basic objectives, as follows:

1. To provide the public sector, government, the business community, scientific institutions, international donor organizations and social organizations with information on different indicators of the population’s living conditions, as well as on available resources for satisfying basic needs.

2. To provide information for the evaluation of the results of different forms of government policy and programs developed with the aim to improve the population’s living standard. The survey will enable the analysis of the relations between and among different aspects of living standards (housing, consumption, education, health, labor) at a given time, as well as within a household.

3. To provide key contributions for development of government’s Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper, based on analyzed data.

Geographic coverage

National coverage. Domains: Urban/rural/mixed; Federation; Republic

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

A total sample of 5,400 households was determined to be adequate for the needs of the survey: with 2,400 in the Republika Srpska and 3,000 in the Federation of BiH. The difficulty was in selecting a probability sample that would be representative of the country's population. The sample design for any survey depends upon the availability of information on the universe of households and individuals in the country. Usually this comes from a census or administrative records. In the case of BiH the most recent census was done in 1991. The data from this census were rendered obsolete due to both the simple passage of time but, more importantly, due to the massive population displacements that occurred during the war.

At the initial stages of this project it was decided that a master sample should be constructed. Experts from Statistics Sweden developed the plan for the master sample and provided the procedures for its construction. From this master sample, the households for the LSMS were selected.

Master Sample [This section is based on Peter Lynn's note "LSMS Sample Design and Weighting - Summary". April, 2002. Essex University, commissioned by DfID.]

The master sample is based on a selection of municipalities and a full enumeration of the selected municipalities. Optimally, one would prefer smaller units (geographic or administrative) than municipalities. However, while it was considered that the population estimates of municipalities were reasonably accurate, this was not the case for smaller geographic or administrative areas. To avoid the error involved in sampling smaller areas with very uncertain population estimates, municipalities were used as the base unit for the master sample.

The Statistics Sweden team proposed two options based on this same method, with the only difference being in the number of municipalities included and enumerated. For reasons of funding, the smaller option proposed by the team was used, or Option B.

Stratification of Municipalities

The first step in creating the Master Sample was to group the 146 municipalities in the country into three strata- Urban, Rural and Mixed - within each of the two entities. Urban municipalities are those where 65 percent or more of the households are considered to be urban, and rural municipalities are those where the proportion of urban households is below 35 percent. The remaining municipalities were classified as Mixed (Urban and Rural) Municipalities. Brcko was excluded from the sampling frame.

Urban, Rural and Mixed Municipalities: It is worth noting that the urban-rural definitions used in BiH are unusual with such large administrative units as municipalities classified as if they were completely homogeneous. Their classification into urban, rural, mixed comes from the 1991 Census which used the predominant type of income of households in the municipality to define the municipality. This definition is imperfect in two ways. First, the distribution of income sources may have changed dramatically from the pre-war times: populations have shifted, large industries have closed and much agricultural land remains unusable due to the presence of land mines. Second, the definition is not comparable to other countries' where villages, towns and cities are classified by population size into rural or urban or by types of services and infrastructure available. Clearly, the types of communities within a municipality vary substantially in terms of both population and infrastructure.

However, these imperfections are not detrimental to the sample design (the urban/rural definition may not be very useful for analysis purposes, but that is a separate issue). [Note: It may be noted that the percent of LSMS households in each stratum reporting using agricultural land or having livestock is highest in the "rural" municipalities and lowest in the "urban" municipalities. However, the concentration of agricultural households is higher in RS, so the municipality types are not comparable across entities. The percent reporting no land or livestock in RS was 74.7% in "urban" municipalities, 43.4% in "mixed" municipalities and 31.2% in "rural" municipalities. Respective figures for FbiH were 88.7%, 60.4% and 40.0%.]

The classification is used simply for stratification. The stratification is likely to have some small impact on the variance of survey estimates, but it does not introduce any bias.

Selection of Municipalities

Option B of the Master Sample involved sampling municipalities independently from each of the six strata described in the previous section. Municipalities were selected with probability proportional to estimated population size (PPES) within each stratum, so as to select approximately 50% of the mostly urban municipalities, 20% of the mixed and 10% of the mostly rural ones. Overall, 25 municipalities were selected (out of 146) with 14 in the FbiH and 11 in the RS. The distribution of selected municipalities over the sampling strata is shown below.

Stratum / Total municipalities Mi / Sampled municipalities mi 1. Federation, mostly urban / 10 / 5 2. Federation, mostly mixed / 26 / 4 3. Federation, mostly rural / 48 / 5 4. RS, mostly urban /4 / 2 5. RS, mostly mixed /29 / 5 6. RS, mostly rural / 29 / 4

Note: Mi is the total number of municipalities in stratum i (i=1, … , 6); mi is the number of municipalities selected from stratum

Abstract

The VHLSS 2010 was conducted nationwide with a sample size of 69,360 households in 3,133 communes/wards which were representative at national, regional, urban, rural and provincial levels. The survey collected information during four periods, each period in one quarter from the second quarter to the forth quarter in 2010 and one period in the first quarter of 2011 through face-to-face interviews conducted by interviewers with household heads and key commune officials in communes containing sample enumeration areas. The survey collected information to be a base for assessment of living standard, poverty and the gap between the rich and the poor serving for policy making, planning and national targeted programs of the party and the State in order to continuously improve the living standard of citizen across the country, in all regions and localities.

Geographic coverage

Whole country

Analysis unit

• Households
• Individuals
• Consumption expenditure item/ product

Universe

The survey is respresentative at national, urban, rural and provincial levels.

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

The VHLSS 2010 was conducted nationwide with a sample size of 69,360 households in 3,133 communes/wards which were representative at national, regional, urban, rural and provincial levels. Indicators belonging to other areas of specialty are compiled from the VHLSS 2010 data for clarification and in-depth analysis of factors impacting on living standards, so results on these indicators should not be used in place of published data on these subject matters. Average household size in 2010 was 3.89 persons overall with a gradual decline seen over time (it was 4.44 persons in 2002, 4.36 persons in 2004, 4.24 persons in 2006 and 4.12 in 2008). This trend was seen in both urban and rural areas, in all regions and for different income quintiles. Average household size was higher in rural areas than in urban areas, higher among poor households than among better off households and higher in mountainous areas than in delta nregions. According to the VHLSS 2010, the average household size in rural areas was 3.92 persons, 1.03 times higher than that in urban areas and it was approximately the same as in 2008 (this figure in 2008 was 1.02 times higher). Average household size of the poorest households (quintile 1) was 4.18 people, 1.2 times higher than of the richest households (quintile 5). Household size in the Northern midlands and mountain areas and the Central Highlands is higher than in other regions.

Sampling deviation

There are three stage stratified cluster design. The sample of the VHLSS is selected in the way to represent the entire country (in which: urban/rural areas), 8 regions (in which: urban/rural areas), and proviences/cities. According to the Master Sample, there are two stage area sample from enumeration areas of the 1999 Population and Housing Census. There are also in the technical document, informations about the PSU (Primary Sampling Unit), SSU (Secondary Sampling Unit), Sample Allocation and Sample Size.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument

The survey questionnaire contains 11 sections:

Section 1. Some basic demographic characteristics related to living standards Section 2. Education Section 3. Labour - Employment Section 4. Health and health care Section 5. Income Section 6. Consumption expenditure Section 7. Durable goods Section 8. Housing, electricity, water, sanitation facilities and use of Internet Section 9. Participation in poverty reduction programs Section 10. Business production activities Section 11. Commune general characteristics

Cleaning operations

Data editing took place at a number of stages throughout the processing, including:

a) Office editing and coding b) During data entry c) Structure checking and completeness d) Secondary editing e) Structural checking of Stata data files Detailed documentation of the editing of data can be found in the "Data processing guidelines" document provided as an external resource.

Abstract

This study aims to help address the issue of the appropriate use of statistical data in policy development in Serbia. Faced with enterprise restructuring, high unemployment and high levels of social exclusion, as well as the consequences of internal population displacement, the Government of Serbia (GoS) has recognized and acknowledged the need for fundamental reforms in social policy area and the collection of adequate data of social statistics. Reliable household data are scarce in Serbia, with the result that social policy making is put on a precarious basis. The exceptional circumstances of Serbia have left a legacy of immense complexity, in which social groups have become fractured and excluded. A statistically reliable basis for policy making, particularly in the social sphere, is a priority. Data on poverty and living standards are seen as a part of information system to support decision making by the GoS and its line Ministries. The public is also keenly interested in poverty data. Therefore poverty data are also crucially important for strategic planning bodies within GoS, and for donors in assessing their strategies in support of the Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRS).

Geographic coverage

National

Analysis unit

Households

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

The population for LSMS consists of Republic of Serbia residents, excluding Kosovo and Metohija . The sampling frame for the LSMS was based on the Enumeration District (ED) delineated for the 2002 Serbia Census, excluding those with less than 20 households. It is estimated that the households in the excluded EDs only represent about 1 percent of the population of Serbia. The sampling frame also excludes the population living in group quarters, institutions and temporary housing units, as well as the homeless population: these groups also represent less than 1 percent of the population, so the sampling frame should cover at least 98 percent of the Serbian population. Stratification was done in the same way as for the previous LSMSs. Enumeration District were stratified according to: (1) Region in 6 strata (Vojvodina, Belgrade, West Serbia, Sumadija and Pomoravlj e, East Serbia and South East Serbia) (2) Type of settlement (urban and other)

The allocation of EDs according to region and type of settlement was propoI1ionai to the number of occupied dwellings, adjusted to provide sufficient precision of estimates at the regional level. To provide optimal sample sizes in each region we decided that the minimum number of allocated EDs to each stratum should be 60. The result of this procedure was a slight deviation from strictly proportional allocation. The sample size for LSMS 2007 was 71 40 households from 510 selected EDs. Within each ED 14 occupied dwellings were selected. From each selected occupied dwelling one household was selected (using a Kish Grid). The sample size was determined according with the aim of achieving 5,000 household interviews with an expected non-response rate of around 30%. The final response rate was 78%, producing a sample size of 5,557 households.

Sampling deviation

The overall estimated total number of households from the 2007 LSMS based on the final weights is about 10 percent lower than the corresponding figure from the 2002 Census frame. The difference is larger for the rural strata (12.1 percent) than the urban strata (8.7 percent). These differences probably include an actual decline in the number of households in some strata and may also reflect the quality of the updating of the listing of occupied dwelling units in sample EDs.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Response rate

Response rate was 78 percent

Abstract

Starting June 1999, after the intervention of NATO in the conflict between Kosovo and Serbia (FRY), the United Nations provided interim administration for the province. The consequences of the conflict on the living standards of the population were severe, with the collapse of the industrial sector, the paralysis of agriculture, and extensive damage to private housing, education and health facilities and other infrastructure. In addition, the conflict brought massive population displacement both within Kosovo and abroad.

A year later, Kosovo was in a process of transition from emergency relief to long-term economic development. The purpose of the survey was to provide crucial information for policy and program design for use by the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), international donors, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and the Kosovar community at large for poverty alleviation and inequality reduction.

During the same period, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) was planning an agriculture and livestock survey. It was decided to join both surveys, in order to pool resources and provide better assistance to the newly re-formed Statistical Office of Kosovo (SOK) and to take into account the extensive Kosovar peasant household economy. Therefore the agriculture and food aid modules are more developed than those of a standard LSMS survey.

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) also was interested in information related to labor force and employment. They had run a socio-demographic and reproductive health survey with the United Nations Population Fund, covering approximately 10,000 households at the end of 1999. IOM provided the urban sampling frame for the present survey.

Geographic coverage

Kosovo. Domains: Urban/rural; Area of Responsibility (American, British, French, German, Italian); Serbian minority

Analysis unit

• Households
• Individuals
• Community

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

SAMPLE DESIGN

The sample design used in the Kosovo LSMS 2000 had to contend with the fact that the last census, conducted in 1991, was rendered obsolete by the boycott of the Albanian population and by the massive displacements since March 1998. A Housing Damage Assessment Survey (HDAS) was conducted in February 1999 and updated in June 1999 by the International Management Group (IMG) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in the rural areas. The survey covered 95 percent of the Albanian rural areas and provided the basis for the rural sampling frame, after updating. The updating and household listings in selected villages were conducted by FAO.

Since the HDAS did not cover Serbian villages, a quick counting4 of housing units was performed in these villages, following a procedure similar to the one in the urban areas. In urban areas, the original plan was to use the information from the on-going individual voters’ registration conducted by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Since the registration was limited to individuals above 16 years old, it was then decided to conduct a quick counting of households in the 22 urban areas. The quick counting and subsequent listing of households was performed by IOM, under the supervision of the sampling expert hired by the World Bank. . FRAMEWORK

UNMIK divided Kosovo into 5 areas of responsibility (AR), roughly equivalent to the former regions (American – Southeast, British – East including Pristina, French – North, German-South, Italian – West). The rural frame used the IMG/UNHCR Housing Damage Assessment Survey. It was updated with the collaboration of FAO and provided much better information on which to build the sample for the survey. Aerial pictures of the villages selected in the survey were used to help identifying housing units. Only one household was interviewed in each housing unit. For the Serbian villages, counting households and making listings had to be elaborated by the survey team.

In urban areas, IOM contracted the quick counting to SOK in the Albanian cities and to firms in the Serb areas. These firms updated existing lists, or performed some quick counting. Using the updated information IOM created enumeration areas of size 150-200 housing units. Based on this quick counting, a full listing took place in all the selected EAs and 12 households were randomly selected. Given safety issues and quality problems discovered at the enumeration stage, the Serb urban listings were revised after the end of the survey, by the Serb survey team, who had performed the rural listings.

The sample was preset at 2,880 households in order to allow analyses in the following breakdowns: (a) Kosovo as a whole; (b) by area of responsibility, (c) by urban/rural locations. In addition, the survey data can be used to derive separate estimates for the Serbian minority.

In the rural area, 30 Albanian villages were randomly selected in each AR and a listing of all households in the village was established.5 In each village, 12 households were then randomly selected (8 for interviewing and 4 reserve households). Similarly, 30 urban enumeration areas (between 150 and 200 households lie in each urban EA) were randomly selected in the Albanian part of each AR. Twelve households were then selected in each EA. In the rural area, 30 Serb villages were selected from the three municipalities in the northern part of Kosovo, the enclaves and the municipality of Strepce. Thirty urban EA were selected in the same region. In each village and urban area, 12 households were then randomly selected.

STRATIFICATION

In addition to the explicit stratification of the areas of responsibility and the ethnic composition in each rural and urban category, an implicit stratification of geographic ordering in a serpentine method in the villages and urban enumeration areas was followed. In order to be able to provide estimates for the separate domains described above, it was recommended that 240 households be interviewed in each domain. We had very little prior knowledge of response rates. In the rural villages, it was decided to select 12 households and identify 4 of them as “reserve households”. These reserve households were to be used only in specific cases, described at length to the logistics person/driver of the interviewing team. The final sample size was 1,200 rural and urban Albanian households and 240 rural and urban Serb households, for a total sample size of 2,880 households.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument

Two questionnaires were used to collect the information: a household questionnaire and a community questionnaire. No anthropometric information was collected as malnutrition problems, facing Kosovar children and women, would not be detected by these procedures.

Since FAO and SOK were conducting a price survey in 7 cities of Kosovo, on a monthly basis, it was decided to not include a separate price questionnaire but use the data from the FAO-SOK price survey. The Kosovo LSMS 2000 collected information using a household questionnaire, which was based in part on the standard LSMS questionnaire developed in Grosh and Glewwe (2000).

The standard questionnaire was adapted to the specifics of the Kosovar environment and special modules about displacement, food aid and social protection were added. Individual modules were administered as much as possible to most informed respondents. Box 1 contains a summary of the content of the questionnaire.

The community questionnaire was designed to collect information on community-level infrastructure, with a special emphasis on school and health facilities as well as displaced persons issues. Box 2 contains a summary of the content of the community questionnaire. [Note: Community is defined as the Primary Sampling Unit (PSU) of the survey. In rural areas, it generally encompasses villages unless these are less than 50 households (in which case, they were grouped with a neighboring village) or more than 200 households (in which case, they were broken-up in PSUs of 50-200 households). In urban areas, community is defined as the Enumeration Area but includes the larger city when referring to secondary school and university, hospitals and factories.]

Response rate

Households from the original sample selection which could not be interviewed were replaced by reserve households to reach the final sample size. The non-response rate among households originally selected for inclusion in the sample in rural Albanian areas was 11.8 percent and 20.8 percent in urban Albanian areas. These rates in the Serbian areas were 14.2 percent among rural households and 39.2 percent among urban households.

In the rural Albanian areas, non-response came mostly from households having moved outside of the village. A few refusals were due to the fact that households were in mourning or celebrating other religious occasions (wedding, baptisms, circumcisions, etc…), or the household head was a women alone. There were only 20 actual refusals of the originally selected households, only 2 percent of the 1,200 households originally contacted.

In the Serbian rural areas, half of the non-responses were due to households having traveled to Serbia for visits (holidays, health care issues, indefinite travel….). Other reasons included: interviewer’s safety (houses too isolated) and households refusing to respond in the absence of the head. There were only 5 such cases, again only 2 percent of the 240 households originally contacted. In the urban areas, 10 percent of the non-responses were linked to listings problems (non-existent addresses).

West Virginia and Kansas had the lowest cost of living across all U.S. states, with composite costs being half of those found in Hawaii. This was according to a composite index that compares prices for various goods and services on a state-by-state basis. In West Virginia, the cost of living index amounted to **** — well below the national benchmark of 100. Virginia— which had an index value of ***** — was only slightly above that benchmark. Expensive places to live included Hawaii, Massachusetts, and California. Housing costs in the U.S. Housing is usually the highest expense in a household’s budget. In 2023, the average house sold for approximately ******* U.S. dollars, but house prices in the Northeast and West regions were significantly higher. Conversely, the South had some of the least expensive housing. In West Virginia, Mississippi, and Louisiana, the median price of the typical single-family home was less than ******* U.S. dollars. That makes living expenses in these states significantly lower than in states such as Hawaii and California, where housing is much pricier. What other expenses affect the cost of living? Utility costs such as electricity, natural gas, water, and internet also influence the cost of living. In Alaska, Hawaii, and Connecticut, the average monthly utility cost exceeded *** U.S. dollars. That was because of the significantly higher prices for electricity and natural gas in these states.

The study included four separate surveys: 1. The LSMS survey of general population of Serbia in 2002 2. The survey of Family Income Support (MOP in Serbian) recipients in 2002 These two datasets are published together. 3. The LSMS survey of general population of Serbia in 2003 (panel survey) 4. The survey of Roma from Roma settlements in 2003 These two datasets are published together separately from the 2002 datasets. Objectives LSMS represents multi-topical study of household living standard and is based on international experience in designing and conducting this type of research. The basic survey was carried out in 2002 on a representative sample of households in Serbia (without Kosovo and Metohija). Its goal was to establish a poverty profile according to the comprehensive data on welfare of households and to identify vulnerable groups. Also its aim was to assess the targeting of safety net programs by collecting detailed information from individuals on participation in specific government social programs. This study was used as the basic document in developing Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRS) in Serbia which was adopted by the Government of the Republic of Serbia in October 2003. The survey was repeated in 2003 on a panel sample (the households which participated in 2002 survey were re-interviewed). Analysis of the take-up and profile of the population in 2003 was the first step towards formulating the system of monitoring in the Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRS). The survey was conducted in accordance with the same methodological principles used in 2002 survey, with necessary changes referring only to the content of certain modules and the reduction in sample size. The aim of the repeated survey was to obtain panel data to enable monitoring of the change in the living standard within a period of one year, thus indicating whether there had been a decrease or increase in poverty in Serbia in the course of 2003. [Note: Panel data are the data obtained on the sample of households which participated in the both surveys. These data made possible tracking of living standard of the same persons in the period of one year.] Along with these two comprehensive surveys, conducted on national and regional representative samples which were to give a picture of the general population, there were also two surveys with particular emphasis on vulnerable groups. In 2002, it was the survey of living standard of Family Income Support recipients with an aim to validate this state supported program of social welfare. In 2003 the survey of Roma from Roma settlements was conducted. Since all present experiences indicated that this was one of the most vulnerable groups on the territory of Serbia and Montenegro, but with no ample research of poverty of Roma population made, the aim of the survey was to compare poverty of this group with poverty of basic population and to establish which categories of Roma population were at the greatest risk of poverty in 2003. However, it is necessary to stress that the LSMS of the Roma population comprised potentially most imperilled Roma, while the Roma integrated in the main population were not included in this study.

Abstract

The Living Standards Measurement Survey (LSMS) is a multi-purpose household survey conducted to measure living conditions and poverty situation, and to help policymakers in monitoring and developing social programs.

LSMS has been carried out in Albania in the context of continuing monitoring of poverty and the creation of policy evaluation system in the framework of the National Strategy for Development and Integration (previously the National Strategy for Economic and Social Development).

The first Albania LSMS was conducted in 2002, followed by 2003, 2004, 2005, 2008 and 2012 surveys. In 2012, 6,671 households participated in the survey.

Geographic coverage

National

Analysis unit

• Households
• Individuals

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

The survey includes a sample of 6,671 households that constitute the survey units. The sample is chosen randomly by two rounds of selection. The sample frame was provided from Population and Housing Census done on October 2011. In the first round, 834 Primary Selection Units (PSUs) have been chosen randomly to represent the whole territory of the country. Then, 8 households for each PSU were chosen to be interviewed in the second round through a procedure of systematic sample. To handle cases of non response or no contact other 4 households for each PSU were chosen as substitutes that ensured the target of 6,671 completed questionnaires near the households.

The methodology of the 2012 LSMS has been kept similar with the surveys conducted in the previous years. However, the geographic domains of analysis have been expanded to include the 12 individual prefectures of Albania, by urban and rural strata, compared to four geographic regions (Central, Coastal, Mountain and Tirana) by urban and rural strata defined previously as domains for the survey. This required a considerable increase in the sample size from 3,600 to 6,671 households making possible to calculate indicators of living standard for 24 strata and even for the four main areas of the country in order to compare the regional results to those from the 2002, 2005 and 2008 surveys and study the regional trends for various indicators.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument

The questionnaire was divided in two sections, and was administered to households in two visits, one section per visit. During the second visit the interviewer would also collect additional information of use for the eventual tracking of the household in the next waves of the panel.

The Booklet for Recording Daily Household Consumption was left with the household by the interviewer during the first visit for the household to compile, and collected during the second visit. Upon collection, interviewers took care of checking the entries (also with the help of a checklist provided at the end of the booklet) and correct them as appropriate with the help of the most knowledgeable person in the household.

A specific column was provided for the household to record the reference period for any purchases of food. The checklist was compiled by the interviewer, with the help of the most knowledgeable person in the household, upon collection of the diary. Interviewers were instructed to check, for 14 main food staples, whether any consumption of the item had been recorded in the diary. Whenever an item had not been recorded the interviewer would ask the respondent to report whether the item (a) had not been used in the 14-day period, or (b) had been consumed but the household had forgotten to record its consumption, or else (c) had been consumed by the household drawing on stocks purchased or produced outside the 14-day period. If the inclusion of an item had simply been forgotten the interviewer would then fill the appropriate section of the diary by asking the household to recall the details of that consumption. If the household reported consuming an item purchased before the beginning of the 14-day period, then information on the frequency of purchase, quantity, unit of measure and value of the purchase were recorded in the columns provided to this end in the checklist.

Context

What is most important for how healthy, wealthy, and educated you are is not who you are, but where you are. Your knowledge and how hard you work matter too, but much less than the one factor that is entirely outside anyone’s control: whether you happen to be born into a productive, industrialized economy or not.

Global income inequality is vast. The chart – which shows the world population’s daily incomes adjusted for the price differences across countries – shows this.

The huge majority of the world is very poor. The poorer half of the world, almost 4 billion people, live on less than $6.70 a day.

If you live on $30 a day you are part of the richest 15% of the world ($30 a day roughly corresponds to the poverty lines set in high-income countries).

Content

Data comes from https://ourworldindata.org/global-economic-inequality-introduction

Acknowledgements

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Inspiration

Compare, Analyze inequality per continent, per period...

Abstract

The principal objective of the VNLSS is to collect basic data reflescting the actual living standard of the population. These data then be used for evaluating socio-economic development and formulationg policies to improve living standard. Followings are the main goals by the year of 2000. - Reduce the population growth rate less than 2 % peryear - Reduce the infant mortaility (under 5 years old) 0,81% (1990) to 0,55%; and from 0,46% (1990) to 0,3% (under one year old) - Reduce the mortality rate of women concerning the pregnancy and maternity - Reduce the malnutrition of children under 5years old from 51,5% at present to 40% in 1995 and under 30% by the year of 2000. Heavy malnutrition should not be existed by the year of 2000. - Population can access to safe water resources from 43% (1990) to 82% of which 40% to 80% in rural areas. Population use sanitary latrine from 22% (1990) to 65% of which in rural areas from 15% to 60% - 90 percent of children complete the endeavor universal first level education before the age of 15, and the rest should complete the third grade. By the year of 2000 no children at the age of 15 will be illiterate - Improve the cultural, spiritual life of the children, to ensure that 30% of communes (by the year of 1995) and 50% of communes (by the year of 2000) have entertaining place for children

The main information collected by the survey includes: - Household income and expenditures - Health and education - Employment and other productive and activities - Demographic characteristics and migration - Housing conditions

In addition, the information gatherd is intended to improve planning of economic and social policies in Vietnam and to assist in evaluating the impact of the policies. It should enable decision makers to: - indentify target groups for government assistance - Construct models of socio-economic development policies, both overall and on individuals groups - Analyze the impact of decisions available and of the current economic situation on living condition of household

Geographic coverage

National

Analysis unit

• Households
• Individuals
• Community

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

Sample Design The sample covers 4800 households from all areas of Viet Nam. The sample design was self-weighted, which means that each household in Viet Nam had the same probability of being selected. The overall sampling frame was stratified into two groups urban and rural, with sampling was carried out separately in each group (strata). About 20% of Vietnamese households live in urban areas, so the sample stratification ensures that 20% of selected households also come from urban areas. Within urban and rural areas, two lists of all communes was drawn up (one of urban communes and another of rural ones), province by province, in "serpentine" order. 2 The selection of communes within each list was done to ensure that they were spread out evenly among all provinces in Viet Nam.

The VNLSS sample design is the following. Within each province in Viet Nam, rural areas can be broken down into districts, and districts in turn are divided into communes (Xa). Urban areas in all provinces consist of centers/towns, which are divided into quarters (Quai), and then divided further into communes (Phuong). The number of communes in all of Viet Nam, both urban and rural, is about 10,000, and the average population in each is about 6,500. As explained in Section 4, each survey team covers 32 households in 4 weeks, 16 households in one area, and 16 in another area. For convenience all 32 households (i.e. both sets of 16 household) were selected from the same commune. This implied that 150 communes needed to be randomly selected (32x150=4800), 30 in urban areas and 120 in urban areas. Within urban areas communes can be further divided into clusters (Cum), two of which were selected from which to draw two "workloads" of 16 households (16 from each of the two clusters). The same was done in rural areas, where each commune is divided into several villages (Thon). The average size of urban clusters and rural villages is somewhat less than 1000 households.

The VNLSS sample was drawn in three stages. Because the General Statistical Office in Hanoi knows the current population of each commune in Viet Nam (but not of each cluster or village within each commune), 150 communes were selected out of the 10,000 in all of Viet Nam with the probability of selection proportional to their population size. At the second stage, information was gathered from the 150 selected communes on the population of each cluster (in urban areas) or villages (in rural areas), and two clusters or villages were randomly drawn with probability proportional to their population size. Finally, the third stage involved random selection of 20 households (16 for the sample plus four "extras" to serve as replacements if some of the 16 "originals" could not be interviewed) within each cluster or village from a list of all households within each cluster or village. Note that the first stage of the sample is based on information from the 1989 Census, but the second and third stages use updated information available from the communes. The first and second stage samples were drawn in Hanoi, while the third stage was drawn in the field (see Section 4.3 below for more details).

Implementation

The attached map shows the commune number and approximate location of the 150 communes selected in Viet Nam. Of the 150 communes chosen, one was in a very remote and inaccessible area near the Chinese border and was replaced by another not quite as inaccessible. The actual interview schedule went smoothly. In one instance (commune 68) one of the selected villages was replaced because when the survey team arrived in the village it discovered that most of the adults were away from the village and thus could not be interviewed. In each cluster or village interviews were completed for 16 households, thus the 4800 household target sample was fully achieved. About 3% of the households (155) were replaced; the main reason for replacement was that their occupants were not at home. Only four households refused to participate. Community questionnaires were completed for all 120 rural communes. Price questionnaires were completed for 118 of 120 communes (the exceptions were communes 62 and 63), and comparable price data were collected from existing sources for all 30 urban areas.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument

HOUSEHOLD QUESTIONNAIRE

The household questionnaire contains modules (sections) to collect data on household demographic structure, education, health, employment, migration, housing conditions, fertility, agricultural activities, household non-agricultural businesses, food expenditures, non-food expenditures, remittances and other income sources, savings and loans, and anthropometric (height and weight) measures.

For some sections (survey information, housing, and respondents for second round) the individual designated by the household members as the household head provided responses. For some others (agro-pastoral activities, non-farm self employment, food expenditures, non-food expenditures) a member identified as most knowledgeable provided responses. Identification codes for respondents of different sections indicate who provided the information. In sections where the information collected pertains to individuals (education, health, employment, migration, and fertility) each member of the household was asked to respond for himself or herself, except that parents were allowed to respond for younger children. In the case of the employment and fertility sections it is possible that the information was not provided by the relevant person; variables in these sections indicate when this is the case. The household questionnaire was completed in two interviews two weeks apart: Sections 0-8, were conducted in the first interview, sections 9-14 were conducted in the second interview, and section 15 was administered in both interviews. The survey was designed so that more sensitive issues such as credit and savings were discussed near the end. The content of each module is briefly described below.

I. FIRST INTERVIEW

Section 0 SURVEY INFORMATION 0A HOUSEHOLD HEAD AND RESPONDENT INFORMATION 0B SUMMARY OF SURVEY RESULTS 0C OBSERVATIONS AND COMMENTS

The date of the interview, the religion, ethnic group of the household head, the language used by the respondent and other technical information related to the interview are noted. Section 0B summarizes the results of the survey visits, i.e. whether a section was completed on the first visit or the second visit. Section 0C, not entered into the computer, contains remarks of the interviewer and the supervisor. Since the data in Section 0C are retained only on the questionnaires, researchers cannot gain access to them without checking the original questionnaires at the General Statistical Office in Hanoi.

Section 1 HOUSEHOLD MEMBERSHIP 1A HOUSEHOLD ROSTER 1B INFORMATION ON PARENTS OF HOUSEHOLD MEMBERS 1C CHILDREN RESIDING ELSEWHERE

The roster in Section 1A lists the age, sex, marital status and relation to household head of all people who spent the previous night in that household and for household members who are temporarily away from home. The household head is listed first and receives the personal id code 1. Household members were defined to include "all the people who normally live and eat their meals together in this dwelling. Those who were absent more than nine of the last twelve months were excluded, except for the head of the household and infants less than three months old. A lunar calendar is provided in the

Over the past decade, Albania has been seeking to develop the framework for a market economy and more open society. It has faced severe internal and external challenges in the interim – extremely low income levels and a lack of basic infrastructure, the rapid collapse of output and inflation rise after the shift in regime in 1991, the turmoil during the 1997 pyramid crisis, and the social and economic shocks accompanying the 1999 Kosovo crisis. In the face of these challenges, Albania has made notable progress in creating conditions conducive to growth and poverty reduction. A poverty profile based on 1996 data (the most recent available) showed that some 30 percent of the rural and some 15 percent of the urban population are poor, with many others vulnerable to poverty due to their incomes being close to the poverty threshold. Income related poverty is compounded by the severe lack of access to basic infrastructure, education and health services, clean water, etc., and the ability of the Government to address these issues is complicated by high levels of internal and external migration that are not well understood. To date, the paucity of household-level information has been a constraining factor in the design, implementation and evaluation of economic and social programs in Albania. Multi-purpose household surveys are one of the main sources of information to determine living conditions and measure the poverty situation of a country, and provide an indispensable tool to assist policymakers in monitoring and targeting social programs. Two recent surveys carried out by the Albanian Institute of Statistics (INSTAT) – the 1998 Living Conditions Survey (LCS) and the 2000 Household Budget Survey (HBS) – drew attention, once again, to the need for accurately measuring household welfare according to wellaccepted standards, and for monitoring these trends on a regular basis. In spite of their narrow scope and limitations, these two surveys have provided the country with an invaluable training ground towards the development of a permanent household survey system to support the government strategic planning in its fight against poverty. In the process leading to its first Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP; also known in Albania as Growth and Poverty Reduction Strategy, GPRS), the Government of Albania reinforced its commitment to strengthening its own capacity to collect and analyze on a regular basis the information it needs to inform policy-making. In its first phase (2001-2006), this monitoring system will include the following data collection instruments: (i) Population and Housing Census; (ii) Living Standards Measurement Surveys every 3 years, and (iii) annual panel surveys. The Population and Housing Census (PHC) conducted in April 2001, provided the country with a much needed updated sampling frame which is one of the building blocks for the household survey structure. The focus during this first phase of the monitoring system is on a periodic LSMS (in 2002 and 2005), followed by panel surveys on a sub-sample of LSMS households (in 2003, 2004 and 2006), drawing heavily on the 2001 census information. The possibility to include a panel component in the second LSMS will be considered at a later stage, based on the experience accumulated with the first panels. The 2002 LSMS was in the field between April and early July, with some field activities (the community and price questionnaires) extending into August and September. The survey work was undertaken by the Living Standards unit of INSTAT, with the technical assistance of the World Bank. The present document provides detailed information on this survey. Section II summarizes the content of the survey instruments used. Section III focuses on the details of the sample design. Sections IV describes the pilot test and fieldwork procedures of the survey, as well as the training received by survey staff. Section V reviews data entry and data cleaning issues. Finally, section VI contains a series of annotations that all those interested in using the data should read.

Urbanization is an essential indicator of contemporary society and a necessary historic stage in the industrialization of all countries. Thus, we explore the impact of urbanization on public health using the OLS estimation and a two-way fixed effect model based on annual panel data from 175 countries from 2000 to 2018. This paper also addresses potential endogeneity issues and identifies causal relationships using the coefficient stability tests, system GMM, and instrumental variable method. The results demonstrate that urbanization positively affects public health. Furthermore, we find that the impact of urbanization on public health can be mediated through living standards, and nations with higher living standards reduce the effect of urbanization on public health. An increase in the urbanization rate can promote public health by improving residents' living standards. Our results have significant real-world implications for the research of urbanization and the formulation of public health policy.

Abstract

In 2001, the World Bank in co-operation with the Republika Srpska Institute of Statistics (RSIS), the Federal Institute of Statistics (FOS) and the Agency for Statistics of BiH (BHAS), carried out a Living Standards Measurement Survey (LSMS). The Living Standard Measurement Survey LSMS, in addition to collecting the information necessary to obtain a comprehensive as possible measure of the basic dimensions of household living standards, has three basic objectives, as follows:

1. To provide the public sector, government, the business community, scientific institutions, international donor organizations and social organizations with information on different indicators of the population's living conditions, as well as on available resources for satisfying basic needs.

2. To provide information for the evaluation of the results of different forms of government policy and programs developed with the aim to improve the population's living standard. The survey will enable the analysis of the relations between and among different aspects of living standards (housing, consumption, education, health, labor) at a given time, as well as within a household.

3. To provide key contributions for development of government's Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper, based on analyzed data.

The Department for International Development, UK (DFID) contributed funding to the LSMS and provided funding for a further two years of data collection for a panel survey, known as the Household Survey Panel Series (HSPS). Birks Sinclair & Associates Ltd. were responsible for the management of the HSPS with technical advice and support provided by the Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER), University of Essex, UK. The panel survey provides longitudinal data through re-interviewing approximately half the LSMS respondents for two years following the LSMS, in the autumn of 2002 and 2003. The LSMS constitutes Wave 1 of the panel survey so there are three years of panel data available for analysis. For the purposes of this documentation we are using the following convention to describe the different rounds of the panel survey: - Wave 1 LSMS conducted in 2001 forms the baseline survey for the panel - Wave 2 Second interview of 50% of LSMS respondents in Autumn/ Winter 2002 - Wave 3 Third interview with sub-sample respondents in Autumn/ Winter 2003

The panel data allows the analysis of key transitions and events over this period such as labour market or geographical mobility and observe the consequent outcomes for the well-being of individuals and households in the survey. The panel data provides information on income and labour market dynamics within FBiH and RS. A key policy area is developing strategies for the reduction of poverty within FBiH and RS. The panel will provide information on the extent to which continuous poverty is experienced by different types of households and individuals over the three year period. And most importantly, the co-variates associated with moves into and out of poverty and the relative risks of poverty for different people can be assessed. As such, the panel aims to provide data, which will inform the policy debates within FBiH and RS at a time of social reform and rapid change. KIND OF DATA

Geographic coverage

National coverage. Domains: Urban/rural/mixed; Federation; Republic

Analysis unit

Households

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

The Wave 3 sample consisted of 2878 households who had been interviewed at Wave 2 and a further 73 households who were interviewed at Wave 1 but were non-contact at Wave 2 were issued. A total of 2951 households (1301 in the RS and 1650 in FBiH) were issued for Wave 3. As at Wave 2, the sample could not be replaced with any other households.

Panel design

Eligibility for inclusion

The household and household membership definitions are the same standard definitions as a Wave 2. While the sample membership status and eligibility for interview are as follows: i) All members of households interviewed at Wave 2 have been designated as original sample members (OSMs). OSMs include children within households even if they are too young for interview. ii) Any new members joining a household containing at least one OSM, are eligible for inclusion and are designated as new sample members (NSMs). iii) At each wave, all OSMs and NSMs are eligible for inclusion, apart from those who move outof-scope (see discussion below). iv) All household members aged 15 or over are eligible for interview, including OSMs and NSMs.

Following rules

The panel design means that sample members who move from their previous wave address must be traced and followed to their new address for interview. In some cases the whole household will move together but in others an individual member may move away from their previous wave household and form a new split-off household of their own. All sample members, OSMs and NSMs, are followed at each wave and an interview attempted. This method has the benefit of maintaining the maximum number of respondents within the panel and being relatively straightforward to implement in the field.

Definition of 'out-of-scope'

It is important to maintain movers within the sample to maintain sample sizes and reduce attrition and also for substantive research on patterns of geographical mobility and migration. The rules for determining when a respondent is 'out-of-scope' are as follows:

i. Movers out of the country altogether i.e. outside FBiH and RS. This category of mover is clear. Sample members moving to another country outside FBiH and RS will be out-of-scope for that year of the survey and not eligible for interview.

ii. Movers between entities Respondents moving between entities are followed for interview. The personal details of the respondent are passed between the statistical institutes and a new interviewer assigned in that entity.

iii. Movers into institutions Although institutional addresses were not included in the original LSMS sample, Wave 3 individuals who have subsequently moved into some institutions are followed. The definitions for which institutions are included are found in the Supervisor Instructions.

iv. Movers into the district of Brcko are followed for interview. When coding entity Brcko is treated as the entity from which the household who moved into Brcko originated.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Cleaning operations

Data entry

As at Wave 2 CSPro was the chosen data entry software. The CSPro program consists of two main features to reduce to number of keying errors and to reduce the editing required following data entry: - Data entry screens that included all skip patterns. - Range checks for each question (allowing three exceptions for inappropriate, don't know and missing codes). The Wave 3 data entry program had more checks than at Wave 2 and DE staff were instructed to get all anomalies cleared by SIG fieldwork. The program was extensively tested prior to DE. Ten computer staff were employed in each Field Office and as all had worked on Wave 2 training was not undertaken.

Editing

Editing Instructions were compiled (Annex G) and sent to Supervisors. For Wave 3 Supervisors were asked to take more time to edit every questionnaire returned by their interviewers. The FBTSA examined the work twelve of the twenty-two Supervisors. All Supervisors made occasional errors with the Control Form so a further 100% check of Control Forms and Module 1 was undertaken by the FBTSA and SIG members.

Response rate

The panel survey has enjoyed high response rates throughout the three years of data collection with the wave 3 response rates being slightly higher than those achieved at wave 2. At wave 3, 1650 households in the FBiH and 1300 households in the RS were issued for interview. Since there may be new households created from split-off movers it is possible for the number of households to increase during fieldwork. A similar number of new households were formed in each entity; 62 in the FBiH and 63 in the RS. This means that 3073 households were identified during fieldwork. Of these, 3003 were eligible for interview, 70 households having either moved out of BiH, institutionalised or deceased (34 in the RS and 36 in the FBiH).

Interviews were achieved in 96% of eligible households, an extremely high response rate by international standards for a survey of this type.

In total, 8712 individuals (including children) were enumerated within the sample households (4796 in the FBiH and 3916 in the RS). Within in the 3003 eligible households, 7781 individuals aged 15 or over were eligible for interview with 7346 (94.4%) being successfully interviewed. Within cooperating households (where there was at least one interview) the interview rate was higher (98.8%).

A very important measure in longitudinal surveys is the annual individual re-interview rate. This is because a high attrition rate, where large numbers of respondents drop out of the survey over time, can call into question the quality of the data collected. In BiH the individual re-interview rates have been high for the survey. The individual re-interview rate is the proportion of people who gave an interview at time t-1 who also give an interview at t. Of those who gave a full interview at wave 2, 6653 also gave a full interview at wave 3. This represents a re-interview rate of 97.9% - which is extremely high by international standards. When we look at those respondents who have been interviewed at all three years of the survey there are 6409 cases which are available for longitudinal analysis, 2881 in the RS and 3528 in the FBiH. This represents 82.8% of the responding wave 1 sample, a