Policy Analysis and Management

Prepared with funds from the National Institute on Aging Program Project "Adding Health Variables to the Cross-National Equivalent File 1980-2003" by:

• the Department of Policy Analysis and Management at Cornell University in collaboration with the
• Panel Study of Income Dynamics at the University of Michigan
• the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW),
• the Institute for Social and Economic Research at the University of Essex
• the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research (MI) and 
• Statistics Canada.

The Cross-National Equivalent File 1980-2006 contains equivalently defined variables for the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID), the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP), the British Household Panel Study (BHPS), the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA), and the Canadian Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics (SLID). The data are designed to allow cross-national researchers not experienced in panel data analysis to access a simplified version of these panels, while providing experienced panel data users with guidelines for formulating equivalent variables across countries. Most importantly, the equivalent file provides a set of constructed variables (for example pre- and post-government income and United States and international household equivalence weights) that are not directly available on the original surveys. Since the Cross-National Equivalent File 1980-2005 can be merged with the original surveys, PSID-CNEF users can easily incorporate these constructed variables into current analyses.

The CNEF User Package is contained on a CD-ROM and includes:

1. BHPS data from 1991 to 2005 on over 21,000 individuals and 6,000 households
2. PSID data from 1980 to 1997, 1999, 2001, 2003, and 2005 on over 33,000 individuals and 7,000 households
3. SLID data from 1993 to 2005 on over 95,000 individuals and 32,000 households *
4. GSOEP data from 1984 to 2006 on over 20,000 individuals and 6,000 households.
5. HILDA data from 2001 to 2006 on over 19,000 individuals and 7,000 households
    *SLID data for 1993-2005 are not on the CD but are available to registered users by special arrangement with Statistics Canada.
   
   These data are available in SAS-Windows *.SAS 7bdat,  SPSS-Windows *.SAV,  Stata 9.0 , and ASCII formats.
   
6. A codebook that describes the methods used to create each variable in each country, the algorithm for its creation based in the original survey variable names, and descriptive statistics for each variable in Adobe Acrobat format.
   
   Adobe Acrobat PDF versions of each codebook are available here. If you do not have Acrobat, you can download a FREE copy of Adobe Acrobat Reader.
   
   BHPS-CNEF codebook - Part 1
   BHPS-CNEF codebook - Part 2
   GSOEP-CNEF codebook - Part 1
   GSOEP-CNEF codebook - Part 2
   HILDA-CNEF codebook - Part 1
   HILDA-CNEF codebook - Part 2
   PSID-CNEF codebook - Part 1
   PSID-CNEF codebook - Part 2
   SLID-CNEF codebook - Part 1
   SLID-CNEF codebook - Part 2
   
7. A link to the 2001 paper "The Cross-National Equivalent File: A Product of Cross-National Research" by R.V. Burkhauser, B.A. Butrica, M.C. Daly, and D. R. Lillard , (also available on this site - click here to download) that discusses the construction of comparable variables, supplies a list of supporting publications and working papers, as well as an example of how to use the data file for analyses.
   
   A link to the 2007 paper "The Expanded Cross-National Equivalent File: HILDA Joins its International Peers" by R.V. Burkhauser and D.R. Lillard (also available to download here) that introduces Australian readers to CNEF and its potential for researchers interested in comparing economic well-being, labor market and health outcomes in Australia with those in Canada, Germany, Great Britain and the United States.

   The new cross-national equivalent file includes data from the Swiss Household Panel Study. The new CNEF is described in a 2007 paper "The Cross-National Equivalent File (CNEF) and its Member Country Household Panel Studies" by Joachim Frick, Stephen Jenkins, Dean Lillard, Oliver Lipps, and Mark Wooden.
   

8. Private and Public Income Variables: CNEF contains public (Social Security and Other Government Income) and private income variables. The documentation for these created variables is provided here. This document provides a list of the income variables that were used to create these broader income catogories as well as a detailed description of each of the government programs contained in the public income variable. This document also provides background information for the first paper to use these data in a four country study, Burkhauser, R. V., Giles, P., Lillard, D.R. and Schwarze, J. (2005)."After Death Do Us Part: An Analysis of the Economic Well being of Widows in Four Countries.", Journal of Gerontology 60B(5): S238-S246. 
   
   Websites for the Original Surveys

• BHPS      The British Household Panel Study
• GSOEP    German Socio-Economic Panel
• HILDA     Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia
• PSID         Panel Study of Income Dynamics
• SLID         The Canadian Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics
• SHP-CNEF     The Swiss Household Panel

 Complete instructions for obtaining all the following data may be accessed here.

• PSID-CNEF or download PSID data files here
• BHPS-CNEF
• GSOEP-CNEF
• HILDA-CNEF
• SLID-CNEF
• SHP-CNEF 

For data and information, please contact:
GSOEP/CNEF Project Assistant
Cornell University
Department of Policy Analysis and Management
120 MVR Hall Ithaca, New York 14853-4401 USA
Tel: +1-607-255-8012
FAX: +1-607-255-4071
E-mail: CNEF@cornell.edu