1. Conference on Quality in International Statistics
Maurine A Haver
Haver Analytics
29 May 2012

2. High Quality & Timely Data for Global Strategy & Research
Haver Analytics
High Quality & Timely Data for Global Strategy & Research
Financial Institutions & Money Managers
Central Banks & Other Government Entities
Corporates
Consulting & Nonprofit Research

3. What does “quality” mean?
View of a producer may be very different from that of a user
Users are making decisions or helping others do so
A perfect number in isolation is useless for this purpose

4. Number of Households Total Number of Households Millions
115
115
110
110
105
105
100
100
Census improvement in methodology 95 95 95 00 05 10
Source: Census Bureau
Number of Households
Total Number of Households
Millions
Number of Households.EMF (USECON) POPHM

5. Number of Households with adjustment
Total Number of Households
Millions
120
120
105
105 90 90
Haver Break-Adjusted Series 75 75 80 85 90 95 00 05 10
Source: Census Bureau, Haver Analytics
Number of Households with adjustment
Total Number of Households -
Millions
Number of Households with adjustment.EMF (USECON) POPHM / POPHMJ

6. Recommendation
Producers should consider restatement of data even when it cannot be done perfectly
Access to underlying micro data should lead to the best estimates
Values can be flagged as not meeting statistical standards

7. What do users want?
Comparability
Timeliness
History
Transparency

8. What do users want? Data Comparability
Often do not investigate differences
Ignore differences even when informed
Greatly appreciate comparability of statistics for Euro Area & EU

9. Efforts toward comparability of data should have high priority
Recommendation
Efforts toward comparability of data should have high priority
Differences in methodology across countries would not lead to flawed analysis
True differences would become more readily apparent

10. Not necessary to give up tables presented in familiar formats
US National Accounts now presented in an “ international style” as well
Bank of Italy presents balance sheets according to their original format and the format adopted by the Eurosystem

11. What do users want? Timeliness
Decisions are made using the figures available at the time.
While users do not want large revisions, most welcome a number that may be revised if it means having it sooner

12. What do users want? History Models need history.
Users will create it when it isn’t provided using whatever tools and information are at their disposal.
Producers with the micro data are better suited to making these estimates.

13. What do users want? Transparency
Complete meta data and details on methodology
Revisions should include full information on changes in methodology
Method and options selected for seasonal adjustment

14. What do vendors want? Stability in web sites and database access
Documentation when changes are coming and at least a month of parallel systems
New table layout in advance of release
Data values, not just growth rates
Should be able to calculate reported growth rates from underlying source data

15. Final thoughts
If producers don’t release data, users are going to make it up.
Users and producers need to work together to define the core set of statistics needed to understand the world economy
Collaboration among producers to build a set of comparable statistics is critical