Five-year ACS data at county level for the State of Missouri between 2006 and 2010.

Format:

The data is in a csv file with 17 columns:

• perfambelowpov: percentage of families below the poverty line

• perfambelowpovMOE: margin of error in measuring percentage of families below the poverty line

• totalpeople: population of the county (16 years and over)

• GEO.display-label: name of county

• medianfamilyincome: median family income

• didnotwork: number of adults 16 years and over who worked less than one week per year

• didnotworkmoe: margin of error in measuring number of adults 16 years and over who worked less than one week per year

• percentunemployed: percentage of population over 16 who are unemployed

• percentunemployedMOE: margin of error in measuring percentage of population over 16 who are unemployed

• Total; Estimate; Families : total number of families, estimated from the ACS

• Total; Margin of Error; Families : margin of error in measuring total number of families

• Total; Estimate; Population 16 years and over : total number of people 16 years and over, estimated from the ACS

• Total; Margin of Error; Population 16 years and over : margin of error in measuring total number of people 16 years and over

• In labor force; Estimate; Population 16 years and over : percentage of people in the labor force, estimated from the ACS

• In labor force; Margin of Error; Population 16 years and over : margin of error in measuring the percentage of people in the labor force

• Employed; Estimate; Population 16 years and over : percentage of population over 16 who are employed, estimated from the ACS

• Employed; Margin of Error; Population 16 years and over : margin of error in measuring the percentage of population over 16 who are employed.

Description:

The file contains 17 columns with the fields as described above. Each of the fields denote response summaries over a 5-year period. The margin or error is equal to 1.65*sigma, where sigma^2 is the survey variance for that variable.

The field percentunemployed can be verified from the fields In labor force; Estimate; Population 16 years and over and Employed; Estimate; Population 16 years and over using the following formula:

%unemployed = (%in labor force - %employed) / (%in labor force).

Due to rounding error, the values usually match only up to the first significant figure, however this can be used as an informal 'sanity check' to ensure the downloaded data is correct.

//: # (Note that the variables used in Porter et al. (2015) were percentunemployed and perfambelowpov.).

Percent below poverty line and percent unemployed:

Porter, Holan, and Wikle (2015a, 2015b) illustrated their spatial multivariate methodologies using the two variables: “percentage of families below the poverty line” and “percentage of population over 16 who are unemployed,” using four columns selected from those given in the Description above. The four columns are:

• perfambelowpov: percentage of families below the poverty line

• perfambelowpovMOE: margin of error in measuring percentage of families below the poverty line

• percentunemployed: percentage of population over 16 who are unemployed

• percentunemployedMOE: margin of error in measuring percentage of population over 16 who are unemployed

Recall that the first and third columns denote response summaries over a 5-year period, and the margin of error is equal to 1.65*sigma, where sigma^2 is the survey variance for that variable.

References:

Porter, A.T., Holan, S.H., and Wikle, C.K. (2015a) Multivariate spatial hierarchical Bayesian empirical likelihood methods for small area estimation. STAT, 4: 108--116.

Porter, A.T., Holan, S.H., and Wikle, C.K. (2015b) Small Area Estimation via Multivariate Fay-Herriot Models with Latent Spatial Dependence. Australian & New Zealand Journal of Statistics. 57, 15--29.