The statistical units’ definition and implementation as core element to

guarantee the ESS’ consistency

Giuseppe Garofalo (ISTAT – Italy)

Q 2014 - Special Session: Consistency of Concepts and Applied Methods in Business Statistics

Vienna - 3 June 2014

Source: OECD – Entrepreneurship at a Glance – 2013. Figure 2.11. Productivity level by enterprise size class, total economy Thousands of US dollars per employee, 2010

Source: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/portal/page/portal/european_business/data/main_tables

Italy Germany United Kingdom

100100

57574444

N. of enterprises N. of enterprises

1001009797

8282

Val. Added / Pers. employed

Val. Added / Pers. employed

LeU = EntProfilingLeU = Ent

Tr. turnover => Half time employee’ remuneration Tr. 17.500 euros Tr. 73.000 pounds

no S13 IUsyes S13 IUs ? S13 IUs

IT UK

1001009595

Val. Added / Pers. employed

Val. Added / Pers. employed

Tr = 73.000 pounds Tr = 17.500 euros

9090 100100

IT DE

Use of different thresholds to identify the population of Italian enterprises

Coherence between DB and SBS data N. of countries by classes of differences

Differences N. of enterprises N. of persons employed

1 3 16

0.95 – 1.05 6 9

0.90 – 1.10 5 -

0.80 – 1.20 5 -

< 0.80 - > 1.20 6 -

35 % of thetotal EU’ENTs

44 % of thetotal EU’per. employed

Source: SBS Steering Group – April 2014

Coherence vs Consistency

Coherence: the extent to which differences between statistics can be attributed only to differences between to the true values of the characteristics they estimate

Country b

Country a Time t

Time t +1

Region

Nation

Europe

Monthly

Quarterly

Yearly

Variable fromdomain a

Variable fromdomain b

domain a domain b

domain c

Consistency: correspondence and uniformity among the parts of a complex system.

Outputs of the statistics

Processes of the statistics

Coherence, consistency and the statistical business domains

Financial domains

Commoditydomains

Innovationdomains

Employmentsdomains

SBSSBS

STS – turn.STS – turn.

STS – priceSTS – price

R&DR&D

FatsFats

Ext. TradeExt. Trade

FDIFDI

ProdcomProdcom

STS – prod.STS – prod.

TourismTourism

EnergyEnergy

ICTICTLCSLCS

SESSES

JVSJVS

Demography Demography

CoherenceVerticalConsistency Time

Consistency

TimeConsistency Horizontal

consistency

Nat. ACCNat. ACC

The role of the Statistical Unit – present situation

ESSnet on consistency of concepts and methods of business-related statistics – 2010 project on statistical units:

•Deliverable 1.1: Direction Report (by Norbert Rainer – STAT Austria).•Deliverable 3.1: Identification and evaluation of business statistics regulations inconsistency (by Sarmite Prole and Svetlana Jesilevska - CSB Latvia).•Deliverable 3.2 part 1 and 2: Identification and evaluation of Member States inconsistency (by Monica Consalvi and Danila Filipponi - ISTAT Italy, Joseph Keating - CSO Ireland, Pierrette Schulz and Sylvie Mabile - INSEE France, Sarmite Prole and Svetlana Jesilevska - CSB Latvia, Kerstin Gruber - STAT Austria)

It is well accepted the necessity to overcome the identified limitations and contradictions of the Regulation 696/93 and the need to increase the coherence of the European economic figures and to build consistent statistics.

Must be understood as to avoid the risk of falling back into the same limitations and contradictions

A consistent definition of a Statistical Unit. The route

1. The willingness component

reduction of the “power” (needs) of the individual parts (each NSI, each domain) to guarantee an homogeneous “government of the system”.

2. The semantic component identification of the context, objective and scope

National European/global and/or

Competivenessprofitabilityproductivity

or Physical production

• Different contents of statistical unit definition• Different level and typology of coherence and consistency • Different “degree of rigor” in the application of the

definition for various subpopulations

A consistent definition of a Statistical Unit. The route

3. The syntactic component.

describes how a definition should be built

a) Not permitting the deduction of a contradictions from the different part of the definition

b) Do not use duplication of concepts

c) Do not use generic concepts not well explained

d) Do not use verbs that allow a “free” interpretation

sells in its own will…which will? legal, economic, of ownership?

…can be constituted by one legal unit, a combination of legal units or of parts of legal units……………………………can correspond to a single legal unit…, an enterprise group…, or …part of an enterprise group…….

4. The semiotics component.

Identifies clarifications and specifications for the practical and homogeneous implementation of the definition.