Economics & Public Policy Extra

We now have access to the Interuniversity Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR).  ICPSR acquires, preserves, enhances and distributes original social science research data for research and instruction.  You will need to create an account in order to download data.

 “Our data advance scientific knowledge by making it possible for students, policymakers and researchers to conduct secondary analyses.  We are a leading training resource in quantitative analysis methods.

 Membership benefits

• A wealth of data.  ICPSR provides access to important data in the social sciences and benefits all faculty and students across a campus.
• Access to training and instruction at discounted rates.  Members of ICPSR receive discounted tuition and travel stipends toward ICPSR’s renowned Summer Program in Quantitative Methods of Social Research.
• User support.  ICPSR has over 45 years of experience in supporting data use.”

We have a trial to International Historical Statistics until 11th May.

“The IHS series is a unique collection of statistics covering a wide range of socioeconomic topics. It is a collection of data sets taken from hundreds of disparate primary sources, including both official national and international abstracts – back to 1750. The new online edition provides updated statistics to 2010 – covering 260 years. The collection is a truly interdisciplinary resource; it will be of interest to academics, researchers and students in sociology, politics, history, economics, business, environment, international relations, geography and statistical studies and related professional services alike.”

“StatsLC provides support for learning and teaching statistics in various settings and media.

Our materials are correct and based on current research on how statistics is best taught and learnt. StatsLC provides support for learning and teaching statistics in various settings and media.

“The Coutts Million Pound Donor Report is the first study to focus exclusively on UK charitable donations worth £1 million or more. It aims to capture and track trends in major giving, including the size of donations above a million pounds, the type of donors making gifts of this size and the causes that are benefiting.

There is currently very little reliable data to help us understand what is going on at this end of the UK philanthropy sector. General surveys capture information on giving by the general population, but there is a widely accepted need to plug the data-gap on the size, source and impact of the largest charitable donations.

In addition to presenting and analysing the findings, this report includes case studies of million pound donors and million pound recipients, to help contextualise the data and bring to life the experience of giving and receiving donations worth a million pounds or more.”
Source: LIS-SOCIALSCIENCE@JISCMAIL.AC.UK

New support material now available on the OECD iLibrary YouTube channel – http://www.youtube.com/OECDiLibrary:

• We have posted updated thematic videos providing Key Facts on thematic content available on OECD iLibrary. The playlist is available  here.
• The first video tutorial providing an Introduction to OECD iLibrary is now also posted. It outlines the main elements of OECD iLibrary and explains the various content items and features in an overview. Follow the direct link to view it.  We will post soon more tutorials exploring the various features of OECD iLibrary in greater detail.

You will also find links to all support material on the Help page of OECD iLibrary.

OECD iLibrary Customer Services – Publishing Division
Public Affairs & Communications Directorate

As you may know, the ESRC are establishing a new UK Data Service which integrates several existing services including the Economic and Social Data Service (ESDS), the Census Programme and the Secure Data Service.

Work is now underway to establish an identity for the new service. To make it a cohesive and meaningful brand, we’d like to hear from data users – those who currently use digital research data, and those who might use it in the future.

Below is a link to a short survey designed just for data users. It’s a quick and fun questionnaire – not a research study, but a way to get some initial indications of what you think should characterise the UK Data Service’s ‘brand’. It should take less than 10 minutes of your time, and all responses are anonymous.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/UKdataservice_users

If interested, please complete the questionnaire by Sunday evening, 16^th September.

“Eurostat is currently evaluating the usefulness of EU-SILC, and examining the options for the future of the survey.  They have commissioned a small team at ISER to write a report on one aspect of the EU-SILC, namely the design of the longitudinal component of the survey.

As part of this exercise, we have prepared a survey for the research community, asking researchers about their experiences with the EU-SILC data, and what they think about the different options for changing the design.

I would be extremely grateful if you could complete the survey – we have tried to keep it short and simple.  It may be found at https://essex.eu.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_eQC5D4XtnOmzE0t”

Dr Maria Iacovou (maria@essex.ac.uk)
Director of Graduate Studies
Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER), University of Essex

The IMF have produced outreach videos to add visual content to the data they generate and to help students understand current issues.  One of the latest videos deals with defining recessions:

http://www.imf.org/external/mmedia/view.aspx?vid=1758007402001

and youth unemployment:

http://www.imf.org/external/mmedia/view.aspx?vid=1495714766001

All current videos are available through:

http://www.imf.org/external/mmedia/index.aspx

The YouTube version (if you prefer):

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=UUIYhr3JsLYfKkCM7-W5B6DA&feature=plcp

And, are downloadable:

www.thenewsmarket.com/imf

This report presents experimental estimates from the first annual Subjective Well-being Annual Population Survey (APS) dataset, April 2011 to March 2012.  Overall estimates of people’s views about their own well-being are provided as well as estimates for: key demographic characteristics (such as age, sex, ethnic group), different geographic areas and countries within the UK, aspects which are considered important for measuring national well-being (such as personal relationships, health and work situation).  These first annual estimates of subjective well-being are considered experimental statistics, published at an early stage to involve users in their development.  ONS is
collecting subjective well-being estimates to complement existing socio-economic indicators to allow a fuller statistical picture of the nation’s well-being.

We now subscribe to Passport GMID.  Passport is Euromonitor International’s global market analysis software platform, that analyses industry in countries around the world.  It monitors industry trends and gives strategic analysis, market size and market share for many products across countries.  It provides unique data sets developed specifically for the industry, complete coverage of all relevant channels and products, long historic and forecast data series, comparable across countries, and reports by local analysts analysing the characteristics of each country.