Question
A researcher at Concordia is looking for a database that would provide microdata about corporate charitable donations for all SMEs (small and medium enterprises) in Canada (or if it is not possible to limit to SMEs, all companies in Canada). He is not interested in aggregated data, only in firm-level figures. At this point, he is only exploring the availability of such a dataset, so he has not specified a date range yet.
Since we are talking about business microdata, I suppose that the only option would be CDER, am I right? Can this information (presumably collected from T2 Corporation Income Tax returns or similar sources) be accessed through CDER or otherwise?
Answer
In response to your request for firm level figures, I followed up with a contact from CDER – see the response below:
"If the client is referring to what appears on Schedule 2 Charitable Donations and Gifts, then yes, it would be available on CDER. If he wants to work with the micro data, CDER would be his only alternative."
For more information on the confidentiality and security of data in CDER, the following information is available on the FAQ site <http://www.statcan.gc.ca/eng/cder/questions#q2>:
CDER is located within Statistics Canada's Ottawa headquarters. Researchers work alongside full-time Statistics Canada employees who will screen the results that will be released and ensure compliance with confidentiality policies and procedures.
Researchers access data on a dedicated server through computers with no links outside Statistics Canada. They are only provided with the minimum amount of information necessary to complete their research projects. The data that the researchers do use are stripped of identifying information, such as names, contact information, business numbers, detailed geography and industry. Moreover, a combination of measures – user agreements and synthetics databases – are in place to prevent researchers from perusing the individual observations in their data bases.
