IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bdi/wptemi/td_870_12.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

To misreport or not to report? The measurement of household financial wealth

Author

Listed:
  • Andrea Neri

    () (Bank of Italy)

  • Maria Giovanna Ranalli

    () (Department of Economics, Finance and Statistics, University of Perugia)

Abstract

The objective of the paper is to adjust for the bias due to unit non-response and measurement error in survey estimates of total household financial wealth. Sample surveys are a useful source of information on household wealth. Yet, survey estimates are affected by non-sampling errors. In particular, in the case of household wealth, unit non-response and measurement error can severely bias the estimates. Using the Italian Survey on Household Income and Wealth (SHIW), we exploit the available auxiliary information in order to assess the magnitude of this bias. We find evidence that for this kind of survey, non-sampling errors are a major issue, possibly more serious than sampling errors. Moreover, in the case of SHIW the potential bias due to measurement error seems to outweigh that induced by non-response.

Suggested Citation

  • Andrea Neri & Maria Giovanna Ranalli, 2012. "To misreport or not to report? The measurement of household financial wealth," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 870, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    • Handle: RePEc:bdi:wptemi:td_870_12
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.bancaditalia.it/pubblicazioni/temi-discussione/2012/2012-0870/en_tema_870.pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ruppert,David & Wand,M. P. & Carroll,R. J., 2003. "Semiparametric Regression," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521785167.
    2. Claudia Biancotti & Giovanni D'Alessio & Andrea Neri, 2008. "Measurement Error In The Bank Of Italy'S Survey Of Household Income And Wealth," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 54(3), pages 466-493, September.
    3. Ruppert,David & Wand,M. P. & Carroll,R. J., 2003. "Semiparametric Regression," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521780506.
    4. Giovanni D'Alessio & Ivan Faiella, 2002. "Non-response behaviour in the Bank of Italy�s Survey of Household Income and Wealth," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 462, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    5. Emilia Bonaccorsi di Patti & Enrico Sette, 2012. "Bank balance sheets and the transmission of financial shocks to borrowers: evidence from the 2007-2008 crisis," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 848, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    6. Leandro D�Aurizio & Ivan Faiella & Stefano Iezzi & Andrea Neri, 2006. "The under-reporting of financial wealth in the Survey on Household income and Wealth," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 610, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Giovanni D'Alessio & Andrea Neri, 2015. "Income and wealth sample estimates consistent with macro aggregates: some experiments," Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) 272, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    2. Philip Vermeulen, 2016. "Estimating the Top Tail of the Wealth Distribution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(5), pages 646-650, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    unit non-response; measurement error; auxiliary information; subsampling; imputation;

    JEL classification:

    • C2 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables
    • C42 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics - - - Survey Methods
    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bdi:wptemi:td_870_12. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/bdigvit.html .

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.