The Retrospective Bias in Unemployment Reporting by Sex, Race and Age

摘要: Abstract This article examines differences in reported unemployment between a survey taken the week following individuals' labor force experience and one conducted year later on retrospective basis. Using limited number of annual observations, we find relative understatement for groups containing large proportions women youth. However, certain other groups, namely central age males older women, method appears to overstate current reporting. To explain these findings offer several hypotheses relating social roles primary secondary workers fact that member respondent are frequently not same individual.