The Spanish Survey of Household Finances (EFF): Description and Methods of the 2008 Wave

Abstract

This paper describes the methods of the third wave of the Spanish Survey of Household Finances (EFF2008), paying special attention to the innovations relative to the previous waves. The EFF2008 was designed to give continuity to the information on household finances collected through the EFF2002 and the EFF2005. A desirable characteristic present in all three waves is the oversampling of wealthy households. This is achieved on the basis of the wealth tax through a blind system of collaboration between the National Statistics Institute and the Tax Office which preserves stringent tax confidentiality. An additional important characteristic of the EFF is that the second and third waves have a full panel component. Further, a refreshment sample by wealth stratum has been incorporated in those two waves to preserve cross-sectional representativity and overall sample size. The EFF is the only statistical source in Spain that allows the linking of incomes, assets, debts, and consumption at the household level. The usefulness of the information contained in a survey such as the EFF has led to the decision from the European system of central banks to conduct a household wealth survey in all euro area countries following a methodology similar to the EFF. Therefore, the EFF2008 will allow harmonized comparisons with the new European wealth surveys.

Keywords: wealth survey, oversampling of the rich, panel, refreshment sample, imputation

JEL Classification: C81, D31