Estimating monthly labour force figures during the COVID‐19 pandemic in the Netherlands

Jan van den Brakel, Martijn Souren and Sabine Krieg

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, 2022, vol. 185, issue 4, 1560-1583

Abstract: Official monthly statistics about the Dutch labour force are based on the Dutch Labour Force Survey (LFS). The LFS is a continuously conducted survey that is designed as a rotating panel design. Data collection among selected households is based on a mixed‐mode design that uses web interviewing, telephone interviewing and face‐to‐face interviewing. Monthly estimates about the labour force are obtained with a structural time series model. Due to the COVID‐19 pandemic, face‐to‐face interviewing stopped. It was anticipated that this would have a systematic effect on the outcomes of the LFS and that the lockdown at the same time affected the real monthly labour force figures. The lockdown indeed marked a sharp turning point in the evolution of the series of the monthly labour force figures and strongly increased the volatility of these series. In this paper, it is explained how Statistics Netherlands produced monthly labour force figures during the COVID‐19 pandemic. It is shown how the sudden change in the mode effects, because face‐to‐face interviewing stopped, were separated from real period‐to‐period changes in the labour force figures. It is also explained how the time series model is adapted to the increased volatility in the labour force figures.

Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/rssa.12869

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:jorssa:v:185:y:2022:i:4:p:1560-1583

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://ordering.onli ... 1111/(ISSN)1467-985X

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A is currently edited by A. Chevalier and L. Sharples

More articles in Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A from Royal Statistical Society Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().