Question:
I have a faculty member contacting me about the Labour Force Survey for 2016. The occupational variables for all the months in 2016 are blank. I double checked the data in Nesstar and none of the occupation variables include the year 2016 – they are all prior to 2015. The occupation variables return in the 2017 data. I was reading the documentation, and the occupation codes changed between 2015 and 2016, but I would still expect to find the new codes in 2016. Is this an error?
Answer:
Subject matter returned the following comments:
No this isn’t an error. The occupational codes were removed from the LFS PUMF in 2016 during product revision. The NOC groupings where changed in 2017 to better protect respondent confidentiality and mitigate the risk of disclosure.
During the reassessment phase in 2016, the classification was completely removed with no plans to reintroduce it. Which does in fact create a break in the series.
