# **Table 1: What should be in labor force modules used in low-income countries?**

|**Issue**|**Recommendation**|
|---|---|
|**_(1) What is work and who is in the labor force?_**|Use screening questions at the start of a questionnaire or module.|
|Questionnaires need clear definitions of work<br>(economic activity) that can be understood by all<br>survey participants and users to get consistent<br>and complete measures of LFP and number of<br>economic activities.|Include separate questions on non-wage work which may take place at<br>home or away from home. Only after a rigorous screening for potential<br>economic activities should inactivity be established – see row 5 below<br>(Beegle et al, 2010).<br>Screening questions should establish whether the individual undertook<br>multiple economic activities.|
||All activities identified in the screening questions should be followed up<br>subsequent questions/modules to ensure that primary and secondary<br>activities are captured.|
|**_(2) How long should the recall period be?_**<br>The OECD and ILO standard 7 day recall will miss<br>economic activities when seasonality is important.|<br>Use 12 month recall period in screening questions and in the more detailed<br>parts of the questionnaire to capture seasonality in both wage and non-<br>wage economic activity, especially for agricultural activities (Schaffner,<br>2000). When a 12 month recall period is used for activity screening, a<br>complete picture oftotaleconomic activityinthehousehold emerges.|
|**_(3) When should a 7-day recall period be_**<br>**_used?_**|A 7-day recall will not report accurately the number of labor force<br>participants active in a particular activity such as seasonal agricultural<br>wage work or part time nonfarm enterprise activity over the last year.<br>However, a 7-day recall period is used in ILO international statistics for<br>measuring wage employment, and for the calculation of unemployment<br>(ILO, 1993). Thus surveys should also ask which of the 12 month activities<br>were donewithinthelast7-days to collect data comparableinternationally.|
|**_(4) Who is unemployed?_**|For those who did not do any of their 12 month activities within the last<br>week, a series of screening questions are needed to determine if someone<br>is actually unemployed. Screening according to the standard ILO definition<br>(did not work even one hour during the last 7 days; available for work; and<br>actively sought work through specific steps) is recommended even though<br>it generally produces a low unemployment rate in low-income countries.<br>_Self-definitions are not_advisable, as the word “unemployment” is usually<br>not consistently understood by the respondent and responses are therefore<br>idiosyncratic andinconsistent.|
|**_(5) Who is inactive/ out of the labor force and_**<br>**_why?_**<br>When women do all their economic tasks at home,<br>respondents might think they are inactive and<br>miss their labor force participation.|Introducing types of inactivity (such as household chores) into the interview<br>at the same time as types of activity can cause confusion for the<br>respondent, especially if only one choice is permitted. Establish inactivity<br>and reasons for inactivity_only after a rigorous screening for potential_<br>_economic activities_to avoid missing part-time or non-monetary activities.<br>(Beegle et al,2010)|
|**_(6) When should questions about economic_**<br>**_activity asked at the household level and when_**<br>**_at the individual level?_**<br>Measuring labor input and earnings in different<br>types of household economic activities requires<br>different methods. This makes measuring<br>earnings and income more complicated in low-|The type of module depends on whether the activity is remunerated<br>according to_individual performance_or the performance of_the household_.<br>Questions about hours worked in activities can be asked of individuals in<br>the employment module. If an activity is only part time during the year, the<br>recall period for hours worked needs to recognize this – a 7 day recall on<br>hours would not be enough.|
|income countries.|Earnings, benefits in kind, etc. on activities where_remuneration for labor_<br>_expended is given to an individual_ (e.g. wagework) canbeincludedinthe|

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