Chuck Humphrey, Anna Bombak, Lindsay Johnston, Leah Vanderjagt

1
The Winter Institute on Statistical Literacy for
Librarians
Day 2
2
Outline

• Introductions
• Statistics and data what are we talking about?
• Definitions, standards, and metadata
• Official statistics
• Sources, finding tools, and search strategies
• Census geography and small area statistics
• Non-official statistics

3
Official Statistics

• Anna Bombak
• WISLL II, February 21, 2008

4
Official vs. non-official statistics

• Official statistics are those produced by
  government bodies (such as Statistics Canada) and
  some international or inter-governmental agencies
  (such as the U.N.).
• Non-official statistics are produced by other
  bodies, including trade associations,
  professional organizations, banks, consultants,
  marketing companies, academic institutions, and
  so on.

5
Official statistics -- official definition

• Section 2 of the Statistics Act 1975 defines
  official statistics as "statistics derived by
  Government Departments from
• 1. Statistical surveys as defined in this
  section and
• 2. Administrative and registration records and
  other forms and papers the statistical analyses
  of which are published regularly, or are planned
  to be published regularly, or could reasonably be
  published regularly".
• 'Statistical survey' means "a survey of
  undertakings, or of the public of New Zealand,
  whereby information is collected from all persons
  in a field of inquiry or from a sample thereof,
  by a Government Department pursuant to the
  authority of this Act or any other Act, or
  without specific provision in any Act, wholly or
  primarily for the purpose of processing and
  summarising by appropriate statistical procedures
  and publishing the results of the survey in some
  statistical form". -- Statistics New
  Zealand

6
Official statistics -- objectives

• Official statistics are statistics produced by
  government agencies to
• shed light on economic and social conditions
• develop, implement and monitor policies
• inform decision making, debate and discussion
  both within government and the wider community
• Government and its administrative arms need
  official statistics for policy development,
  implementation and evaluation. The public at
  large have similar information needs in order to
  evaluate government policy, to ensure public
  accountability, and to be adequately informed
  about social and economic conditions.
• 
  -- Statistics New Zealand

7
Official statistics -- context

• Official statistics can mean different things
  to different people. There are three broad ways
  of defining it
• First, it may be defined in terms of people
  providing the service (e.g., the Government
  Statistical Service).
• Second, it may be defined in terms of activities
  (e.g., collecting data, publishing statistics,
  providing statistical advice to support policy
  work).
• Third, it may be defined in terms of outputs, or
  products of statistical work (e.g., the published
  statistics on the labour market, on crime, on
  health, etc).
• -- U.K. Command Paper no. 3882,
  1998. Statistics A Matter of Trust

8
Official statistics -- quality

• There is no standard definition among
  statistical agencies for the term official
  statistics. There is a generally accepted, but
  evolving, range of quality issues underlying the
  concept of 'fitness for use'. These elements of
  quality need to be considered and balanced in the
  design and implementation of an agency's
  statistical program.
• --
  Statistics Canada

9
Official statistics -- assessment

• Attributes of quality that make statistics fit
  for use
• Relevance
• Accuracy
• Timeliness
• Accessibility
• Interpretability
• Coherence
• --
  Statistics Canada

10
Official statistics -- standards

• Official statistics must go through a formal
  process in their creation and release.
  Definitions of concepts are a critical aspect of
  the process, as are the methodologies for
  collecting and producing the statistics. This
  relates directly to the accuracy, coherence, and
  interpretability aspects of quality assessment
  described by Statistics Canada.

11
Official statistics -- sources

• Official statistics can be created from
  administrative databases, such as birth or death
  certificates or from national surveys, such as
  the Labour Force Survey, which is used to
  determine employment statistics.

12
Surveys
Administrative Records

• Census
• Canadian Community Health Survey
• Labour Force Survey
• General social survey
• National Longitudinal Survey of Children and
  Youth
• Business Register
• Survey of Household Spending
• Survey of Giving, Volunteering, and Participating
• Participation and Activities Limitation Survey
• Ethnic Diversity Survey

• Vital Statistics
• Hospital Morbidity Database
• National Health Expenditure Database
• Crime reports
• Court reports
• Education reports
• Longitudinal Administrative Data System National
  Accounts
• LIDS (Landed Immigrant Data System)
• Income Statistics (Canadian Revenue Agency)

13
Federal official health statistics
Report of the Auditor General of Canada, 2002
14
Health Indicators integrating many data sources

• Statistics Canada
• vital statistics and cancer registry
  (administrative data)
• health surveys NPHS, CCHS, other
• census
• labour force survey
• crime statistics
• Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI)
  
• provincial health ministries,
• Health Canada administrative data
• hospital morbidity database
• discharge abstract database,
• other health care system statistics

15
Finding Canadian Statistics

• Anna Bombak
• WISLL II, February 21, 2008

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Finding statistics
17
Finding statistics -- perspectives

• Data perspective to identify a data source
  from which the statistics could be produced. This
  approach relies on knowledge of data sources
  collected by agencies.
• Government Publications perspective to
  identify an agency which produces such a
  statistic. This approach relies on knowledge of
  governmental structure and the content for which
  agencies are responsible.

18
Statistics Canada -- an essential source

• In Canada, as in many other Commonwealth
  countries, there is a central statistical body
  responsible for gathering, processing, and
  publishing statistics. Statistics Canada is the
  first place to look when trying to find
  statistics about Canada or Canadians. Statistics
  Canada not only provides statistics at the
  national level, but may also provide data
  unavailable elsewhere at the provincial/territoria
  l, municipal, or even sub-municipal level.

19
Statistics Canada -- the Greatest Hits

• The Statistics Canada website encompasses many,
  many, important statistical databases,
  publications, and other sources of statistical
  information.
• It would be outside the scope of any presentation
  to list them all, but some of the more useful
  places to look when searching for Canadian
  statistics on the Statistics Canada website are

20
Statistics Canada -- the Greatest Hits

• Summary Tables
• Statistics by Subject
• Community Profiles
• Census
• E-Stat
• The Daily
• Internet Free Publications

21
Statistics Canada -- Summary Tables

• The Summary Tables, formerly called Canadian
  Statistics, provide an overview of statistical
  information on Canadas people, economy and
  governments.
• Tables are indexed by subject, by
  province/territory/metropolitan area, or by an
  alphabetical list of topics.

22
Statistics Canada Statistics by Subject

• This entry on the Statistics Canada homepage
  groups together all Statistics Canada resources
  on a subjects such as Aboriginals, Children
  Youth, Crime Justice, Government, etc.
• In addition to data tables, Statistics by Subject
  provides information from The Daily,
  Publications, and other Statistics Canada
  resources, as well as links to relevant external
  sources.

23
Statistics Canada -- Community Profiles

• The Community Profiles provide community-level
  information from the 2006 Census of Population.
  Users can search for an area of interest by
  typing its 'place name' in a search box or by
  clicking on a province/territory from a list and
  then selecting the desired community area.
• New for 2006 Census Tract (CT) Profiles provide
  2006 Census data for census tracts.

24
Statistics Canada -- Census

• The Census of Population provides a snapshot of
  Canada's demographic, social and economic
  characteristics every five years.
• The Census provides population and dwelling
  counts not just at the national level, but also
  for each province/ territory, and for smaller
  geographic units such as cities or districts
  within cities.
• The Census of Agriculture provides statistics on
  farm operators, land use and land practices, farm
  finances, crops and horticulture and livestock
  for most Canadian communities.

25
Statistics Canada -- E-STAT

• E-STAT is an interactive database containing
  statistical time-series about society and the
  economy in Canada, and is free online to
  educational institutions. E-STAT contains
  Canada-wide community information, current and
  historical population and agricultural census
  data, and data from the Human Activity and the
  Environment and Aboriginal Peoples surveys. Data
  tables may be downloaded in a variety of formats
  as well as transformed into colour maps and
  graphs. This makes it an excellent resource for
  student papers.

26
Statistics Canada -- The Daily

• The Daily is Statistics Canada's official release
  bulletin, the Agency's first line of
  communication with the media and the public. The
  Daily issues news releases on current social and
  economic conditions and announces new products.
  It provides a comprehensive one-stop overview of
  new information available from Statistics Canada.

27
Statistics Canada -- Free Internet Publications

• Statistics Canada provides Free Internet
  Publications containing statistics and analysis
  in the form of survey results, research reports,
  technical papers, periodicals, census products,
  and research compendia. Online publications date
  from 1996 to the present.

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Statistics Canada -- other resources

• Printed publications
• Pre-mid-90s publications available in Depository
  Libraries
• Censuses from 1871-1996
• Historical Statistics of Canada (printed and
  online)
• Canada Yearbooks (some years available online as
  e-Book)
• Definitions, data sources and methods
• 1-800-263-1136 - Enquiries line and other contact
  information

29
Government of Canada -- web site

• The Government of Canada web site serves as a
  comprehensive information and portal site to all
  federal government departments, crown
  corporations, and other federal-government-associa
  ted agencies. This is a good place to start when
  seeking specific statistics not available or
  easily found through Statistics Canada.

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Canadian Federal Departments

• Canada Revenue Agency
• some taxation statistics
• Citizenship and Immigration Canada
• immigration, refugees, international adoption
• Dept. of Finance
• National Budget
• Dept. of National Defense the Canadian Forces
• some expenditure statistics
• Health Canada
• disease occurrence statistics
• Indian and Northern Affairs Canada
• Northern expenditures, etc.

31
Some other federal statistical sources

• Aboriginal Canada Portal
• comprehensive portal site to all statistics and
  topics relating to Canadian First Nations
• Bank of Canada
• Canadian financial statistics, rates, etc.
• Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI)
• statistics on the Canadian health care system
  (hospitals, health care providers, health
  indicators, etc.)

32
Provincial statistical sources

• Most (all?) Provinces/Territories now regrettably
  lack a centralized statistical bureau. However,
  provincial government web sites often contain
  much useful statistical information, particularly
  in the areas of employment, tourism, small
  business and other economic data, as well as
  statistics embedded in provincial departments
  Annual Reports
• E.g. Government of Alberta homepage

33
Municipal statistical sources

• City, town, and village government web sites
  often contain statistical information, including
• civic censuses
• police crime reports
• taxation and municipal expenditure
• economic and small business data
• housing and construction

34
Finding Tools Exercises

• Anna Bombak
• WISLL II, February 21, 2008

35
Some tools for finding statistics

• Catalogues
• NEOS Libraries Catalogue
• Statistics Canada Online Catalogue
• Guides
• Guide to Statistical Sources
• Resource Guide to Health Statistics
• Canadian Economic Statistics Research Guide
• Databases
• Statistical
• Bibliographic -- Fulltext, Indexesabstracts,
  etc.
• Google
• Statistics Canada web site
• Government Info The Daily
• Census of Canada
• U of A Data Library web site
• Statistics Canada web site