TY  - THES
T1  - Topics on Official Statistics and Statistical Policy
T2  - Statistics
Y1  - 2016
A1  - Zachary Seeskin
AB  - My dissertation studies decision questions for government statistical agencies, both regarding data collection and how to combine data from multiple sources. Informed decisions regarding expenditure on data collection require information about the effects of data quality on data use. For the first topic, I study two important uses of decennial census data in the U.S.: for apportioning the House of Representatives and for allocating federal funds. Estimates of distortions in these two uses are developed for different levels of census accuracy. Then, I thoroughly investigate the sensitivity of findings to the census error distribution and to the choice of how to measure the distortions. The chapter concludes with a proposed framework for partial cost-benefit analysis that charges a share of the cost of the census to allocation programs.    Then, I investigate an approximation to make analysis of the effects of census error on allocations feasible when allocations also depend on non-census statistics, as is the case for many formula-based allocations. The approximation conditions on the realized values of the non-census statistics instead of using the joint distribution over both census and non-census statistics. The research studies how using the approximation affects conclusions. I find that in some simple cases, the approximation always either overstates or equals the true effects of census error. Understatement is possible in other cases, but theory suggests that the largest possible understatements are about one-third the amount of the largest possible overstatements. In simulations with a more complex allocation formula, the approximation tends to overstate the effects of census error with the overstatement increasing with error in non-census statistics but decreasing with error in census statistics.    In the final chapter, I evaluate the use of 2008-2010 property tax data from CoreLogic, Inc. (CoreLogic), aggregated from county and township governments from around the country, to improve 2010 American Community Survey (ACS) estimates of property tax amounts for single-family homes.    Particularly, I evaluate the potential to use CoreLogic to reduce respondent burden, to study survey response error and to improve adjustments for survey nonresponse. The coverage of the CoreLogic data varies between counties as does the correspondence between ACS and CoreLogic property taxes. This geographic variation implies that different approaches toward using CoreLogic are needed in different areas of the country. Further, large differences between CoreLogic and ACS property taxes in certain counties seem to be due to conceptual differences between what is collected in the two data sources. I examine three counties, Clark County, NV, Philadelphia County, PA and St. Louis County, MO, and compare how estimates would change with different approaches using the CoreLogic data. Mean county property tax estimates are highly sensitive to whether ACS or CoreLogic data are used to construct estimates. Using CoreLogic data in imputation modeling for nonresponse adjustment of ACS estimates modestly improves the predictive power of imputation models, although estimates of county property taxes and property taxes by mortgage status are not very sensitive to the imputation method.
JF  - Statistics
PB  - Northwestern University
CY  - Evanston, Illinois
VL  - PHD
UR  - http://search.proquest.com/docview/1826016819
ER  -