DOI: 10.3886/icpsr33882.v1
title: Current Population Survey, August 2011: Veterans Supplement
title: Version 1

description: This data collection is comprised of responses from two sets of survey questionnaires, the basic Current Population Survey (CPS) and a survey on the topic of Veterans in the United States, which was administered as a supplement to the August 2011 CPS questionnaire. The sponsor of the biennial supplement survey were the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), formerly the Veterans Administration, and the Department of Labor.The CPS, administered monthly, is a labor force survey providing current estimates of the economic status and activities of the population of the United States. Specifically, the CPS provides estimates of total employment (both farm and nonfarm), nonfarm self-employed persons, domestics, and unpaid helpers in nonfarm family enterprises, wage and salaried employees, and estimates of total unemployment. Data from the CPS are provided for the week prior to the survey.The Veterans Supplement portion of the study was designed to be a self-response survey and interviewers were instructed to make up to two personal or telephone callbacks before accepting a proxy interview. The Veterans Supplement provided estimates on the demographic and labor force characteristics of veterans 17 years old and over, including those who had a service-connected disability. The data also identified Gulf War era veterans and Vietnam theater veterans -- those who actually served in Vietnam, Laos, or Cambodia. Estimates of the number of veterans with and without a service-connected disability along with their labor force participation rates, occupational distributions, unemployment rates, periods of military service, and use of certain educational and job-training programs are provided.Demographic variables include age, sex, race, Hispanic origin, marital status, veteran status, educational attainment, occupation, and income.
description: All veterans aged 17 or older were asked questions from the Veterans Supplement (Items S1-S17). Item SCK2 was filled by the instrument based on entries from corresponding items (PUAFEVER and PUAFWHN1-4) from the basic portion of the CPS monthly instrument. Item S1 determined Vietnam theater status and was asked only of Vietnam veterans. Item CK-S1A isolated veterans 63 years of age and older who might possibly have served at the beginning of the Vietnam era as defined in Item S1A. Item S1A then determined whether the respondent actually did serve during this period. Item S1A1 determined whether the respondent served in Iraq since 2003. Item S1A2 determined whether the respondent served in Afghanistan since 2001. Items S1b, S1c, S1d, S10b, and S10c asked about Reserve or National Guard status. Item S4 screened for disabled veterans and Items S5 through S9 were asked only of disabled veterans. Item S10 asked for the year last separated from the military. Item S10a asked about branch of service. Item S11 obtained the number of years on active duty. Item S11a asked about combat or war zone service. Items S12 through S17 asked about participation in transition assistance, job training, and job placement programs; most of these items were asked only of veterans who were less than 65 years old.
description: The veterans weight -- PWVETWGT -- should be used to tally any estimates from the Veterans Supplement data whether or not basic labor force items were used. Also, use the veterans weight to tally any estimates for veterans and nonveterans from the basic CPS.Additional weight variables include: Household Weight -- HWHHWGT -- Used for tallying household characteristics.; Family Weight -- PWFMWGT -- Used only for tallying family characteristics.; Longitudinal Weight -- PWLGWGT -- Found only on adult records matched from month to month (used for gross flows analysis).; Outgoing Rotation Weight -- PWORWGT -- Used for tallying information collected only in outgoing rotations.; Final Weight -- PWSSWGT -- Used for most tabulations (particularly if tabulating just labor force items), controlled to independent estimates for (1) States; (2) Origin, Sex, and Age; and (3) Age, Race, and Sex.; Composited Final Weight -- PWCMPWGT -- Used to create BLS's published labor force statistics.;
description: Datasets: 
 
 DS1: Dataset
description: Current Population Survey Series
description: computer-assisted personal interview (CAPI), computer-assisted telephone interview (CATI) 
Users are strongly encouraged to refer to the User Guide (produced by the Principal Investigators), which contains additional information about the monthly CPS survey methodology, as well as detailed technical documentation specific to the Veterans Supplement. In particular, Attachment 8 of the User Guide contains the supplement questionnaire.
Edited universe statements are defined for individual variables and are located in the Basic or Supplement record layouts found in Attachment 6 or 7 of the User Guide, respectively.
ICPSR removed all FILLER and PADDING variables from the data. As a result, the column locations in any ICPSR-released data product (e.g., codebook and setup files) will have column locations that are not consistent with locations described in the User Guide.
description: The CPS universe consists of all persons in the civilian noninstitutional population of the United States living in households. The August 2011 supplement universe represents the full CPS sample comprising all household members aged 17 years and older.
description: A multistage probability sample was selected to represent the universe of approximately 56,000 households.