Leveraging the American Community Survey (ACS) in Current Estimation for the National Survey of College Graduates (NSCG)

• Activity Number: 520
• Type: Topic Contributed
• Date/Time: Wednesday, August 7, 2013 : 10:30 AM to 12:20 PM
• Sponsor: Survey Research Methods Section
• Author(s): Michael D. Larsen*+ and Benjamin M. Reist
• Companies: The George Washington University and U.S. Census Bureau
• Keywords: Missing data ; Model-assisted estimation ; Panel survey ; Predcition ; Subsampling ; Survey frame

Abstract

The National Survey of College Graduates (NSCG) has been conducted by the Census Bureau for the National Science Foundation (NSF) since the 1960s. It is the nation's only source of detailed statistics on the science and engineering (S&E) labor force. The NSCG uses a rotating panel design and selects its sample on a biennial basis from the American Community Survey to allow both cross-sectional and longitudinal analysis of education, employment, and demographic characteristics of the S&E labor force. Under this design, the NSCG data is collected and released on a biennial or triennial schedule. The 2010 survey cycle marked the initial use of the ACS as a sampling frame for the NSCG. The 2010 NSCG responses allow NSF the ability to produce estimates of the S&E labor force as of the 2010 calendar year. The next NSCG survey cycle is scheduled for 2013 and will allow NSF the ability to produce estimates of the S&E labor force as of the 2013 calendar year. Using the results from the 2010 NSCG survey cycle, we examined the feasibility of producing 2011 and 2012 S&E labor force estimates using 2011 and 2012 ACS data.