analysis of economic and social data
Order Description
Guidelines
1. Please use word processing software when it is convenient to do
so (i.e., when there is limited number of mathematical
expressions). You can show your calculations by hand.
3. If you have consulted any printed materiel such as books,
articles, or Internet sites to help with your answers, please
indicate the references.
6. When you must produce a table and a graph, please include a title
to the table and graph; furthermore, always include all axes and
series labels with a chart.
7. Print all charts on separate sheets and return them with your
assignment. Use the full sheet for displaying your graph.
The following site contains videos on how to find and download data
from CANSIM.
https://www.discoverstatcan.ca/using_cansim.html
1. Go explore CANSIM and find the data for the survey of
household spending for 2013:
a. Construct a table that includes the average expenditure per
household (as it is available in CANSIM) for each of the 10
provinces for the following goods: Total Expenditures,
Meat, Fish and seafood, and Alcoholic beverages.
b. Construct a column graph using Excel that groups the
columns by province (There is an example of this type of
column graph here: https://www.excel-easy.com/dataanalysis/charts.html).
Each column should represent a
percent share of total expenditure and each product’s
column should be grouped by province (in the example from
the above link, the columns are grouped by month – you must
do the same but in this case, the columns are grouped by
province)
c. Which province has the highest share of average household
expenditures for alcoholic beverages? For fish and seafood?
For Meat? In an MS Word document include your answers to
these questions in c).
2. We spent some time in class discussing seasonal adjustment.
The aim of this exercise is to enhance your understanding of
seasonal adjustment.
a. As a first step, I would suggest that you read and
understand the concept of seasonal adjustment as presented
here by Jodi Beggs at about.com:
https://economics.about.com/od/unemployment-category/ss/TheBasics-of-SeasonalAdjustment.htm?utm_source=exp_nl&utm_medium=email&utm_term=
list_economics&utm_campaign=list_economics&utm_content=2015
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Although the article deals with US unemployment data, it
could equally apply to the case of Canada.
At the very end of Ms. Beggs discussion, there is a link to
a simple example calculation she has produced on seasonal
adjustment. It is quite interesting and insightful.
By the way, if you do not know of Jodi Beggs, I would
suggest you explore her website for a few minutes. She does
a lot of neat stuff and she has the rare ability of making
complex concepts understandable. I think that you will find
it interesting.
b. Extract from CANSIM the non-seasonally adjusted quarterly
data series for tourism demand expenditures in Canada for
the period Quarter I, 2010 to Quarter 4, 2014.
c. Plot the figures from part b) on a chart. Can you see the
seasonal effect in the series? Of course you can! If you
look closely, you will also notice the trend in the series.
Analysis of Economic and Social Data ECO 2147 4
d. Now that you have the data, go to the manual Quantitative
Methods for Business and Management.
https://www.mylcc.co.uk/studymanuals/l5/L5_QM4BM.pdf
e. Now you will construct a seasonally adjusted version of the
tourism demand series. Start in section B on page 126.
Start by computing the trend of the series in the same way
as is done in sub-section d) on page 130.
f. From page 130, follow all the subsequent steps as shown in
the manual to arrive at the seasonally adjusted series. In
the end, you should be able to present a table like the one
on page 135. You must only turn in this table with your
assignment. Your calculations must however be completed in
Excel. Ensure that the table is large enough (it should
almost take up a page) so that we can easily read your
numbers. You will now appreciate the meaning of a s.a.
series and how it is constructed.