Data Collection

Labour Market Statistics (Volunteer work): June 2018 quarter

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Labour Market Statistics (Volunteer work): June 2018 quarter en-NZ

Methodology

Methodology

##Labour market statistics (volunteer work): June 2018 quarter##

Labour market statistics about volunteer work provide insights into the volume and type of voluntary work in New Zealand. It looks at the relationship between paid and unpaid work, and the characteristics of the volunteer workforce.

The rotating topic questions on volunteer work were asked of every member of the selected household over the age of 15 years. The questions were embedded within the respondents personal questionnaire. The volunteer work rotating topic was added to the Household Labour Force Survey (HLFS) in the June 2018 quarter, and will be asked every two years, the next being June 2020.

##Survey population##

The target population is the entire group from which you would ideally like to get information. The target population for the HLFS is the working-age population of New Zealand. We define this as "the non-institutionalised population 15 years and over, who usually live in New Zealand." Specifically the target population excludes:

  • people who have been living in New Zealand for less than 12 months, and who do not propose to stay in New Zealand for a total of 12 months or more
  • long-term residents of homes for older people, hospitals, and psychiatric institutions (long-term is defined as six weeks or more)
  • people in prison

The survey population consists of the group members (from the target population) who have a chance of being selected as part of the sample (ie they can be identified through the sampling frame). For the HLFS, we apply further exclusions to the target population to create the survey population (often due to cost and practical reasons), from which we then select the HLFS sample. These exclusions are a small percentage of the population and the bias introduced is minimal. The survey population is the target population with these exclusions. People:

  • residing in non-private dwellings (eg people in hotels, motels, hostels, military camp)
  • residing in non-permanent dwellings (eg people in tents or caravans not permanently sited)
  • residing at a wharf or landing place (eg people in ships, boats)
  • residing on islands other than the North, South, and Waiheke islands (eg people on Great Barrier, Kawau, Chatham, and Stewart islands)

##Sample size## The HLFS and (volunteer work rotating topic) aimed to interview 15,000 households, which equates to roughly 30,000 individuals over the June 2018 quarter.

##Interviews## The period of interviewing was for 13 weeks (from 8th April to 7th July 2018). The information obtained relates to the week before the interview (referred to as the ‘reference week’). 1/8th of the sample were interviewed with a personal face-to-face at their home, while 7/8th of interviews were done over the phone.

##Proxies## The HLFS (and volunteer work rotating topic) allows interviewers to take responses from proxies if a respondent is unavailable or unable to answer the questions themselves. Although the evidence regarding the quality of proxy responses is mixed, we expect proxies may not be as accurate as self-responses. Therefore, the HLFS monitors the rate of proxy responses – to gauge the quality of responses. The proxy rate is calculated as the percentage of respondents who had someone else respond on their behalf divided by the total number of respondents.

##Achieved sample rate## The achieved sample rate is calculated by the number of eligible households that responded to the survey as a proportion of the number of total eligible households in the sample. The target for the achieved sample rate for the June 2018 quarter was 76.0% and 70.9% was attained.

##Editing and imputation## There was a minimal approach to editing for the volunteer work rotating topic. The unidentified responses for occupation of volunteer work were recoded where we felt we had enough information.

Organisations that the respondent did volunteer work for was classified into ‘organisation type’ and was chosen by the respondent. An organisation had to be classified into one of four main categories: non-profit, private businesses, government organisations and other. When looking at the name of the organisation it was clear that some of these were in the wrong category. Re-coding of organisation type was done to fit within the International Labour Organisation (ILO) definitions of what each category should contain.

There was no imputation done to volunteer work variables although imputation was done to core HLFS variables in the June 2018 quarter.

##Sampling errors## Sampling errors quantify the variability that occurs by chance because a sample rather than an entire population is surveyed.

We calculate sampling errors using the jackknife method. It is based on the variation between estimates of different subsamples taken from the whole sample. This is an attempt to see how estimates would vary if we were to repeat the survey with new samples of individuals.

We produce sampling errors and confidence intervals for most point and change estimates. Confidence intervals are used to demonstrate the amount of uncertainty associated with a sample estimate; presenting an upper and lower limit for a particular estimate. The HLFS calculates confidence intervals at the 95 percent confidence level, which means that if multiple samples were drawn, 95% of the confidence intervals would contain the true figure.

As the size of the sampled group decrease, the relative sampling errors will generally increase.

##Non-sampling error## Non-sampling errors include unintentional mistakes by respondents when answering questions, variation in the respondent's and interviewer's interpretation of the questions asked, and errors in the recording and coding of data. Stats New Zealand endeavours to minimise the impact of these errors through the application of best survey practices and monitoring of known indicators (e.g. non-response).

##Classifications## The volunteer work release includes specific statistics about occupation of volunteer work and activity group of non-profit organisations. Organisations which people volunteered for were also classified into 4 main groups.

  • Occupation: Description of the work performed classified using ANZSCO 2006: Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupations.

  • Activity group of non-profit organisations: All volunteer work carried out through, or for, a non-profit organisation is classified using the NZSCNPO 2006: New Zealand Standard Classification of Non-profit Organisation.

  • Organisation type: Organisations are categorised into four main groups: non-profit, private businesses, government organisations and other. Other includes community groups and organisations which do not fit into other categories.

##Rounding## All estimates provided in this release have been rounded to the nearest hundred. For this reason estimated totals may differ from the sum of individual cells. All percentages have been calculated using unrounded figures and have been rounded to one decimal place.

##Suppression of data## Some estimates have been suppressed (replaced by 'S' in the tables) for reliability reasons. These suppressed values reflect a low number of responses (weighted count of 1,000 or less).

##Comparing with other datasets## The numbers and rates of volunteer work recorded in this rotating topic were lower than other Stats NZ surveys containing volunteer work statistics (the General Social Survey (GSS) 2016 and Time Use Survey 2009/10 ) and are not comparable.

This is due to a couple of main factors. Most of the interviewing done for this rotating topic was over the phone, so questions were asked in a simple and direct manner with no examples of volunteering given. This lead to a self-defined count of volunteer work. Also by allowing the use of proxy responses, the number of people stating they volunteered was lower than expected. The proxy effect was especially seen with direct volunteering counts, as proxy respondents recorded very low levels for this kind of activity.

The data still provides a rich source of information for volunteer work done by New Zealanders and how it relates to their employment status and the labour market as a whole.

##Confidentiality## Only people authorised by the Statistics Act 1975 are allowed to see confidentialised unit record information, and they must use it only for statistical purposes.

##Liability## While all care and diligence has been used in processing, analysing, and extracting data and information in this publication, Stats NZ gives no warranty it is error-free and will not be liable for any loss or damage suffered by the use directly, or indirectly, of the information in this publication.

##Crown copyright## Information obtained from Stats NZ may be freely used, reproduced, or quoted unless otherwise specified. In all cases Stats NZ must be acknowledged as the source.

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10 30/11/2021 3:46:55 PM