Hilda News - 2004

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21 December 2004

The HILDA data wave 3 is ready for release to researchers in January 2005. Waves 1 and 2 are also being re-released at this time.

As there have been some changes to the licences since the last release, all researchers wishing to access the latest release of the HILDA data will need to complete:

29 October 2004

HILDA Survey Annual Report for 2004

We are currently preparing the HILDA Survey Annual Report for 2004 and would love to include research output by the HILDA data user community. If you have produced any research this year which makes use of the data, please send us the following details:

Conference and working papers
Author's name, title, where the paper was presented, place, date

Publications
Journal articles
Author's name, title, journal, no., edition, year, page numbers
Books
Author's name, title, publisher, place, year

Please also send us details of any forthcoming publications.

We may also be able to include, at our website, a copy of your research or a link to an external site. If you would like us to do this, please send us either a PDF version of your paper, or the URL of the site.

Please email us any research output details by COB Friday 5 November to [email protected]

29 September 2004

The second HILDA Survey research conference is to be held at the University of Melbourne on 29-30 September, 2005. The aim of the survey is to provide a forum for the discussion of research based on the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia Survey. Attendance at the Conference is open to all persons interested in the HILDA Survey and longitudinal survey research. A modest registration fee (probably $150) will be levied.

Submissions of papers are now being sought on any topic that makes use of the HILDA Survey data. Contributions towards the travel and accommodation costs of presenters will be available. (We hope to be able to cover the cost of an economy airfare and two nights accommodation for all presenters.)

We are aiming for 25-30 papers, with priority being given to papers that exploit the longitudinal nature of the data. Papers on methods and cross-national comparisons are also welcome.

200-400 word abstracts of papers for presentation should be submitted by 4 March 2005. Abstracts should be sent to the HILDA Administrative Assistant at [email protected].

Further information about the Conference will be distributed via the HILDA email list, and posted on the HILDA website, in due course.

 

29 September 2004

Australian Journal of Labour Economics & HILDA Database Support

Firstly, a special issue of the Australian Journal of Labour Economics using the HILDA data has just been released.

Secondly, we have recently advertised for a Database Support Officer to supplement our HILDA team here in Melbourne. If you are interested, the position description can be found here. Applications close on 22 October 2004.

27 July 2004

Wave 4 Questionnaires finalised

The questionnaires for HILDA wave 4 have been finalised and are available from our website. The new questions this wave are targeted at youth (people aged under 30), private health insurance, visa categories, religion and some further questions on disabilities. The interviewing for wave 4 is due to begin in mid-August 2004.

Also recently released are the following HILDA technical papers about the wave 2 data:

i) Assessing the Quality of the HILDA Survey Wave 2 Data
ii) Wave 2 Weighting
iii) Income and Wealth Imputation for Waves 1 and 2

The HILDA bibliography continues to grow. A special issue of the Australian Journal of Labour Economics containing eight articles using the HILDA data is expected to be released in August. Data users are reminded to forward to either Mark Wooden (Professor Mark Wooden) or myself details of articles or papers that incorporate findings from HILDA so that they can be added to the HILDA bibliography.

7 July 2004

New Technical Papers

Two new HILDA technical papers have just been released on the HILDA website relevant to users of the Release 2.0 data:

No. 4/04 - July 2004
Author(s): Nicole Watson
Wave 2 Weighting

No. 3/04 - July 2004
Author(s): Nicole Watson
Income and Wealth Imputation for Waves 1 and 2

28 June 2004

Journal of Sociology for a Special Issue on Longitudinal Research

Following is a call for papers from the Journal of Sociology for a special issue on longitudinal research. All Submissions should be sent to Janeen Baxter (details below).

Life Pathways: Insights from Longitudinal Research
A Special Issue of the Journal of Sociology
Journal of The Australian Sociological Association (TASA)
Edited by Associate Professor Janeen Baxter (The University of Queensland) and Professor David De Vaus (La Trobe University)

Increasingly, social research draws upon longitudinal data to examine the paths individuals take through the lifecourse. The value of longitudinal research lies in its focus on social change and the possibility of providing new insights into the causes and consequences of life events, as well as the impact of institutional change on individual lives. In contrast to cross-sectional studies, longitudinal research is able to track individual movements over time, as well as directly investigating the impact of particular life events on social outcomes. Such research provides a dynamic understanding of social processes as opposed to the more static view offered by cross-sectional research.

The collection of longitudinal data is well-established overseas, including a number of countries that have long-running household panel studies. The Australian government has recently invested substantial resources into funding several large-scale longitudinal projects including the Households, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia project (HILDA) and the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC). Many other longitudinal studies have been undertaken in Australia. The increasing availability of such data provides exciting opportunities for social research.

The Journal of Sociology invites substantive or methodological contributions from researchers investigating social issues using longitudinal data. We encourage submissions based on both qualitative and quantitative longitudinal analyses. Submissions are welcome on any substantive topic.

Submissions should be sent by 1st February 2005 to:

Associate Professor Janeen Baxter
School of Social Science
The University of Queensland
St Lucia QLD 4072
AUSTRALIA

12 May 2004

Continuation of the HILDA Survey

As part of the Federal budget released on 11th May, the Commonwealth Government has announced that it will commit a further $22.9m over the next 4 years to ensure the continuation of the HILDA Survey. The funding effectively guarantees that the survey will continue until at least Wave 8.

Needless to say we here at the Melbourne Institute are extremely excited about this development, and look forward to continuing working with our growing community of data users.

30 March 2004

HILDA Survey Wave 3 Response

Interviewing for wave 3 of the HILDA Survey was completed in March 2004 and we now have preliminary data on response rates.

Key figures are provided below (with comparable Wave 2 figures in brackets).

Total respondents = 12,722 (13,041)

Response rates

Overall, we are pleased with these outcomes. For example, the comparable wave-on-wave response rate recorded in the British Household Panel Survey (after excluding proxy interviews which are not permitted in the HILDA Survey) at wave 3 was 90.1%.

WAVE 4

Testing for Wave 4 is currently underway. All survey instruments being used in the Wave 4 Dress Rehearsal are available on our web site.

Key features of Wave 4 include new questions targetted at youth (people under 30 years of age) and on private health insurance and religion, and additional questions about disability.

Technical Papers

Two HILDA technical papers have been released so far in 2004. Both can be downloaded from the HILDA website.

No. 1/04 - January 2004
Author(s): Nicole Watson and Mark Wooden
Wave 2 Survey Methodology

No. 2/04 - March 2004
Author(s): Stephen Horn
Guide to Standard Errors for Cross Section Estimates

Additional papers on weights for Wave 2, income and wealth data imputation and the quality of the wave 2 data are expected to be released in the near future.

Data Users

All users are reminded to send us details of any papers they have written using the HILDA data. These can then be listed in our Bibliography with, if possible, links to where the paper can be downloaded.

Recent papers / reports of interest include:

Nick Parr
Family Background, Schooling and Childlessness in Australia: What HILDA Tells Us
Paper presented to the 2003 British Society of Population Studies Conference, University of Bristol, 10-12 September 2003.
[And forthcoming in the Journal of Biosocial Science.]

Trevor Breusch and Edith Gray
A Re-estimation of Mothers' Forgone Earnings Using Negotiating the Life Course (NLC) Data
Negotiating the Life Course Discussion Paper No. 17, Australian National University, October 2003.

Roger Wilkins
Underemployment in Australia: Evidence from the HILDA Survey
Paper presented to the 5th Path to Full Employment Conference/10th National Conference on Unemployment, University of Newcastle, 10-12 December 2003.

Bruce Headey and Mark Wooden
The Effects of Wealth and Income on Subjective Well-Being and Ill-Being
Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research Working Paper Series No. 03/04, 2004.

Lixin Cai and Guyonne Kalb
Health Status and Labour Force Participation: Evidence from the HILDA Data
Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research Working Paper Series No. 04/04, 2004.

NATSEM
The Lump Sum: Here Today, Gone Tomorrow - Income, Superannuation and Debt Pre and Post Retirement
AMP / NATSEM Income and Wealth Report Issue 7, March 2004.

18 February 2004

HILDA Annual Report 2003

The 2003 HILDA Annual Report has now been released. You can download the report from the website. (If you can only see the 2002 Annual Report, then press the Refresh button on your browser.) Alternatively, if you wait a week or so, a copy of the HILDA Annual Report will be posted to you (as long as you provided us with your address when signing up to the HILDA email list).

If you haven't done so already, you can order the Wave 1 and 2 data by downloading the applicable forms from.

20 January 2004

HILDA data for waves 1 and 2

The HILDA data for waves 1 and 2 can now be obtained.

If you are an existing Australian academic or government researcher, then all you need to do is complete an order form from the website. New Australian academic or government researchers need to complete both a deed of licence and order form from this website.

The order forms and deed of licences applicable to other types of researchers can be obtained from the website.

The package that will be sent to you will contain:

The CD-Rom includes unit-record data for wave 2 together with revised data files for wave 1. The wave 1 data files includes variables not previously released, such as imputed household income and a series of derived after-tax income variables. These variables are also provided for wave 2 along with wealth variables collected in a new wave 2 module. All data are provided in both SAS and SPSS format. In addition, the CD-Rom includes codebooks and other documentation.

In Wave 2, we conducted interviews with:

The attrition rate between waves 1 and 2 was 13.2 per cent.

Following the structure adopted in the first release, the CD-Rom includes a household file and a responding person file for each wave. In addition, we have created the following additional files:

The enumerated file is a person level list of everyone in responding households. The master file is a complete list of individuals who have ever been listed. SAS and SPSS programs have been provided for users to create longitudinal files.

19 January 2004

Panel Data Course and HILDA User Training for 2004

The HILDA User Training for 2004 will run in conjunction with Bob Breunig's Panel Data Course in Canberra from Monday 23 February to Wednesday 25 February.

The HILDA User Training for 2004 will run in conjunction with Bob Breunig's 2004 Panel Data Course in Canberra from Monday 23 February to Wednesday 25 February.

For further information contact Susan Lindsay on 02 6125 0195.