IBUC 2006 Abstract

Labour Force Survey: Handling Multiple-Household Dwellings in Blaise
Zipora Radian, Evgenia Luskin & Chaggit Breuer; CBS Israel, Israel

Israel’s Labour Force Survey (LFS) introduced the use of Blaise to our Central Bureau of Statistics in 1999. The
survey tracks changes to Israel’s labour force, its size and characteristics, the extent of unemployment and other
trends. It also provides demographic information on Israeli households.

The LFS is a continuous panel survey, returning to a sample of approximately 12,000 households four times over
the course of a year and a half. Households are interviewed face-to-face in Panels A and D, and by phone in
panels B and C. Data collection thus far has been achieved using CADI and CATI respectively, but as of next year
we hope to begin using CAPI instead of CADI.

The survey is sampled from a framework of dwellings. One of the problems we encountered during development of
the CAPI questionnaire was related to Multiple-Household Dwellings (MHDs). A household is defined as a group of
persons living in one dwelling who have a common expense budget for food. A household usually consists of a
family, but may also consist of only one person or include persons who have no family relationships. Approximately
3% of all dwellings have multiple households sharing their space. This configuration is most often found among
immigrants, students and foreign workers. Surveyors are expected to interview a representative of each household
in a dwelling. A separate questionnaire must therefore be used for each household.

This paper outlines the complexity of the issue and the solution provided for conducting MHD interviews. Using
Blaise and Maniplus, we have developed a user-friendly questionnaire, able to identify multiple households and to
generate a separate questionnaire for each such household.

Contact: zipora@cbs.gov.il