Survey on Household Income and Wealth

The Survey on Household Income and Wealth (SHIW) is a statistical survey

Statistical survey

Survey methodology is the field that studies surveys, that is, the sample of individuals from a population with a view towards making statistical inferences about the population using the sample. Polls about public opinion, such as political beliefs, are reported in the news media in democracies....

conducted by the Sample Surveys Division of the Banca d'Italia

Banca d'Italia

Banca d'Italia is the central bank of Italy and part of the European System of Central Banks. It is located in Palazzo Koch, Roma, via Nazionale...

(the Italian central bank).
The main objective of the SHIW is to study the economic behaviours of Italian households.
In recent years the survey has been integrated in international research projects such as the Luxembourg Income Study and the Luxembourg Wealth Study, whose aim is to produce a comparable cross-national Data Archive on household income and wealth. Starting from 2008, the survey has also been part of a project conducted by the European Central Bank

European Central Bank

The European Central Bank is the institution of the European Union that administers the monetary policy of the 17 EU Eurozone member states. It is thus one of the world's most important central banks. The bank was established by the Treaty of Amsterdam in 1998, and is headquartered in Frankfurt,...

to produce a harmonized survey on household finances and consumption in the Euro area

Eurozone

The eurozone , officially called the euro area, is an economic and monetary union of seventeen European Union member states that have adopted the euro as their common currency and sole legal tender...

(Survey on Household Finance and Consumption ).

Methodology and scope

The sample size

Sample size

Sample size determination is the act of choosing the number of observations to include in a statistical sample. The sample size is an important feature of any empirical study in which the goal is to make inferences about a population from a sample...

comprises about 8000 households selected from population registers.
In order to analyse any changes in the phenomena under investigation, since 1989 about half of the sample has included households interviewed in previous surveys (panel households).
Data collection is entrusted to a specialised company using professional interviewers and CAPI methodology.

The survey collects the following information:

Characteristics of the household and of its members (number of income earners, gender, age, education, job status, and characteristics of the dwelling);
Income
Income
Income is the consumption and savings opportunity gained by an entity within a specified time frame, which is generally expressed in monetary terms. However, for households and individuals, "income is the sum of all the wages, salaries, profits, interests payments, rents and other forms of earnings...

: (wage and salaries, income from self-employment, pensions and other financial transfers, income from financial assets and real estates);
Consumption
Consumption (economics)
Consumption is a common concept in economics, and gives rise to derived concepts such as consumer debt. Generally, consumption is defined in part by comparison to production. But the precise definition can vary because different schools of economists define production quite differently...

and saving (food consumption, expenses for housing, health, insurance, spending on durable goods, and household saving);
Wealth in terms of real estate
Real estate
In general use, esp. North American, 'real estate' is taken to mean "Property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals, or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this; an item of real property; buildings or...

, financial asset
Financial asset
A financial asset is an intangible asset that derives value because of a contractual claim. Examples include bank deposits, bonds, and stocks. Financial assets are usually more liquid than tangible assets, such as land or real estate, and are traded on financial markets....

s, liabilities;
Special modules such as capital gain
Capital gain
A capital gain is a profit that results from investments into a capital asset, such as stocks, bonds or real estate, which exceeds the purchase price. It is the difference between a higher selling price and a lower purchase price, resulting in a financial gain for the investor...

s, inheritance, risk aversion
Risk aversion
Risk aversion is a concept in psychology, economics, and finance, based on the behavior of humans while exposed to uncertainty....

, unpaid work, economic mobility
Economic mobility
Economic mobility is the ability of an individual or family to improve their economic status, in relation to income and social status, within his or her lifetime or between generations...

, social capital
Social capital
Social capital is a sociological concept, which refers to connections within and between social networks. The concept of social capital highlights the value of social relations and the role of cooperation and confidence to get collective or economic results. The term social capital is frequently...

, tax evasion, financial literacy
Financial literacy
Financial literacy is the ability to understand finance. More specifically, it refers to the set of skills and knowledge that allows an individual to make informed and effective decisions through their understanding of finances...

.

Survey data from 1977 to 2008 are freely available for research purposes on the Bank of Italy’s website (formats: ASCII

ASCII

The American Standard Code for Information Interchange is a character-encoding scheme based on the ordering of the English alphabet. ASCII codes represent text in computers, communications equipment, and other devices that use text...

, SAS

SAS System

SAS is an integrated system of software products provided by SAS Institute Inc. that enables programmers to perform:* retrieval, management, and mining* report writing and graphics* statistical analysis...

and Stata

Stata

Stata is a general-purpose statistical software package created in 1985 by StataCorp. It is used by many businesses and academic institutions around the world...

Main uses

The main uses of the survey are:

for research projects linked to the functions of the Banca d'Italia;
for ex-ante
Ex-ante
The term ex-ante is a neo-Latin word meaning "before the event". Ex-ante is used most commonly in the commercial world, where results of a particular action, or series of actions, are forecast in advance...

evaluation of economic policies through microsimulation
Microsimulation
-Introduction:Microsimulation is a category of computerized analytical tools that perform highly detailed analysis of activities such as highway traffic flowing through an intersection, financial transactions, or pathogens spreading disease through a population...

models such as Euromod and Econlav;
for academic research;
to improve the information coming from macro statistics such as National Accounts
National accounts
National accounts or national account systems are the implementation of complete and consistent accounting techniques for measuring the economic activity of a nation. These include detailed underlying measures that rely on double-entry accounting...

.

The main results of the SHIW are diffused through the Supplements of the Statistical Bulletin.

External links

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Methodology and scope

Main uses

See also

External links