<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>Official economic statistics are uncertain even if not always interpreted or treated as such. From a historical perspective, this article reviews different categorisations of data uncertainty, specifically the traditional typology that distinguishes sampling from nonsampling errors and a newer typology of Manski (2015). Throughout, the importance of measuring and communicating these uncertainties is emphasised, as hard as it can prove to measure some sources of data uncertainty, especially those relevant to administrative and big data sets. Accordingly, this article both seeks to encourage further work into the measurement and communication of data uncertainty in general and to introduce the Comunikos (COMmunicating UNcertainty In Key Official Statistics) project at Eurostat. Comunikos is designed to evaluate alternative ways of measuring and communicating data uncertainty specifically in contexts relevant to official economic statistics.</p></abstract>

Official economic statistics are uncertain even if not always interpreted or treated as such. From a historical perspective, this article reviews different categorisations of data uncertainty, specifically the traditional typology that distinguishes sampling from nonsampling errors and a newer typology of Manski (2015). Throughout, the importance of measuring and communicating these uncertainties is emphasised, as hard as it can prove to measure some sources of data uncertainty, especially those relevant to administrative and big data sets. Accordingly, this article both seeks to encourage further work into the measurement and communication of data uncertainty in general and to introduce the Comunikos (COMmunicating UNcertainty In Key Official Statistics) project at Eurostat. Comunikos is designed to evaluate alternative ways of measuring and communicating data uncertainty specifically in contexts relevant to official economic statistics.

Measuring and Communicating the Uncertainty in Official Economic Statistics

Journal of Official Statistics

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

{"article-title":"Measuring and Communicating the Uncertainty in Official Economic Statistics"}

Official economic statistics are uncertain even if not always interpreted or treated as such. From a historical perspective, this article reviews different...

Measuring and Communicating the Uncertainty in Official Economic Statistics

Published Online: Jun 22, 2021

Page range: 289 - 316

Received: Jun 01, 2019

Accepted: Nov 01, 2020

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/jos-2021-0013

Keywords
Measurement error, data revisions, official economic statistics, data communication

© 2021 Gian Luigi Mazzi et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Measuring and Communicating the Uncertainty in Official Economic Statistics

Published Online: Jun 22, 2021

Page range: 289 - 316

Received: Jun 01, 2019

Accepted: Nov 01, 2020

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/jos-2021-0013

KeywordsMeasurement error, data revisions, official economic statistics, data communication

© 2021 Gian Luigi Mazzi et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Keywords
Measurement error, data revisions, official economic statistics, data communication