Gert G. Wagner

Heike Solga

English

Research Papers in Economics

Heike Solga, Gert G. Wagner
2007
A Modern Statistical Infrastructure
for Excellent Research an Policy Advice
Report on the German Council for Social and Economic Data
during its First Period in O￿ce (2004 – 2006)
Working Paper                 No.  2
RatSWD
Working Paper SeriesContact: Council for Social and Economic Data (RatSWD) | Mohrenstraße 58 | 10117 Berlin | office@ratswd.de 
 
Working Paper Series of the Council for Social and Economic Data 
(RatSWD) 
 
 
The RatSWD Working Papers series was launched at the end of 2007. Since 2009, the series 
has been publishing exclusively conceptual and historical works dealing with the organization 
of the German statistical infrastructure and research infrastructure in the social, behavioral, 
and economic sciences. Papers that have appeared in the series deal primarily with the 
organization of Germany’s official statistical system, government agency research, and 
academic research infrastructure, as well as directly with the work of the RatSWD. Papers 
addressing the aforementioned topics in other countries as well as supranational aspects are 
particularly welcome. 
RatSWD Working Papers are non-exclusive, which means that there is nothing to prevent you 
from publishing your work in another venue as well: all papers can and should also appear in 
professionally, institutionally, and locally specialized journals. The RatSWD Working Papers 
are not available in bookstores but can be ordered online through the RatSWD. 
In order to make the series more accessible to readers not fluent in German, the English section of 
the RatSWD Working Papers website presents only those papers published in English, while the 
the German section lists the complete contents of all issues in the series in chronological order.  
Starting in 2009, some of the empirical research papers that originally appeared in the 
RatSWD Working Papers series will be published in the series RatSWD Research Notes.  
The views expressed in the RatSWD Working Papers are exclusively the opinions of their 
authors and not those of the RatSWD. 
 
The RatSWD Working Paper Series is edited by: 
Chair of the RatSWD (2007/ 2008 Heike Solga; 2009 Gert G. Wagner) 
Managing Director of the RatSWD (Denis Huschka) 
 
   1 
A Modern Statistical Infrastructure for  
Excellent Research and Policy Advice –  
 
Report on the German Council for Social and Economic Data 
during its First Period in Office (2004 - 2006) 
 
 
 
by Heike Solga and Gert G. Wagner 
 
 
In this article, the two chairpersons of the German Council for Social and Economic Data 
(RatSWD: Rat fuer Sozial- und Wirtschaftsdaten) give a summary of the council’s work 
in the years 2004 to 2006 and its future plans for improving the statistical infrastructure 
for economic and social research. The full report on the work of the RatSWD is available 
in German at http://www.ratswd.de.
1 
 
A Brief History 
Given that the starting point for founding the Council was about a decade ago a brief 
review of its history will certainly be welcome. The idea for the RatSWD emerged in 
1999 out of the Commission to Improve the Statistical Infrastructure in Cooperation with 
the Scientific Community and Official Statistics (KVI: Kommission zur Verbesserung der 
informationellen  Infrastruktur  zwischen  Wissenschaft  und  Statistik),  which  had  been 
established  by  the  Federal  Ministry  of  Education  and  Research  (BMBF: 
Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung). The findings outlined in its 2001 final 
report “Towards an Improved Statistical Infrastructure”
2 formed the basis on which the 
Founding Committee of the RatSWD (Gründungsausschuss RatSWD) was convened. In 
its three years of existence—from 2001 to 2004—the founding committee recommended 
four Research Data Centers and two Data Service Centers as well as the RatSWD itself. 
The RatSWD with its 12 members was officially constituted on 1 November 2004 by the 
BMBF.  
 
The first election of the RatSWD’s six individual members, who must be eminent social 
scientists, was held at the Second Conference on Social and Economic Data (KSWD) in 
2004. These members include Steffen Kühnel (Universität Göttingen, Sociology), Heiner 
Meulemann (Universität zu Köln, Sociology), Regina T. Riphahn (Universität Erlangen, 
Economics),  Heike  Solga,  (Universität  Göttingen,  Sociology),  Joachim  Wagner 
(Universität Lüneburg, Economics), and Bettina Westle (Universität Marburg, Political 
science). 
 
                                      
1 Cf. Eine moderne Dateninfrastruktur für eine excellente Forschung und Politikberatung - Bericht über die 
Arbeit des Rats für Sozial- und Wirtschaftsdaten (RatSWD) in seiner ersten Berufungsperiode, eds. 
Gabriele Rolf-Engel, Heike Trappe and Denis Huschka, Berlin 2007, mimeo. 
2 Towards an Improved Statistical Infrastructure - Summary Report of the Commission set up by the Federal 
Ministry of Education and Research (Germany) to Improve the Statistical Infrastructure in Cooperation with 
the Scientific Community and Official Statistics, in: Schmollers Jahrbuch 121 (3), 443-468. The summary is 
also available in German under http://www.ratswd.de   2 
The  six  representatives  of  the  German  research  infrastructures  in  the  social  sciences 
(Statistical Agencies, Research and Service Data Centers as well as GESIS and SOEP) 
include Jutta Allmendinger (IAB:  Institute for Employment Research), Johann Hahlen 
(Statistisches Bundesamt), Eckart Hohmann (Hessisches Statistisches Landesamt), Peter 
Ph. Mohler (GESIS: German Social Science Infrastructure Services), Uwe G. Rehfeld 
(FDZ Deutsche Rentenversicherung Bund), and Gert G. Wagner (SOEP: German Socio-
Economic Panel Study). 
  
A New Infrastructure 
Clear progress has been made since 2004 in labor market research and empirical social 
sciences in general through the establishment of the Research Data Centers which get 
funding by the BMMF. Researchers, especially in economics and sociology, today can 
hardly imagine a research scene without the Centers, although even five years ago their 
existence was virtually inconceivable.  
 
Now we have Research Data Centers at: 
 
·  the  Institute  for  Employment  Research  (IAB:  Institut  für  Arbeitsmarkt-  und 
Berufsforschung)  within  the  Federal  Employment  Agency  (BA:  Bundesagentur  für 
Arbeit) 
·  the German Pension Fund (Deutsche Rentenversicherung Bund) 
·  the Federal Statistical Office (Statistisches Bundesamt) and the Statistical Offices of 
the German Länder (Statistische Landesämter)   
 
and Data Service Centers at 
 
·  the Center for Survey Research and Methodology (ZUMA: Zentrum für Umfragen, 
Methoden und Analysen), which is part of the German Social Science Infrastructure 
Services  (GESIS:  Gesellschaft  Sozialwissenschaftlicher  Infrastruktureinrichtungen) 
and 
·  the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA: Institut zur Zukunft der Arbeit).  
 
Maintaining this modern data infrastructure will be one of the most important tasks for the 
Council in the next few years.  
At present, the data centers are funded as pilot projects of the BMBF and have received 
start-up finance. To ensure their sustainability within the research infrastructure, however, 
it  will  be  crucial  to  find  ways  to  anchor  them  in  existing  institutions  and  to  secure 
financing.  
 
Internal and External Lobbying 
In this summary, we would like to discuss in greater detail a few selected activities carried 
out by the RatSWD to improve data access in the last two years. The activities presented 
here are less visible then the new centers and have been carried out in very diverse fields. 
 
In the field of educational data, the RatSWD has been in part successful, and sadly, in 
part  unsuccessful.  Its  recommendations  on  the  University  Information  System  (HIS) 
resulted in a pilot project in which a scientific use file was created by the 1997 HIS 
Graduate  Panel.  It  can  be  accessed  through  the  Central  Archive  for  Empirical  Social 
Research in Cologne (ZA: Zentralarchiv für Empirische Sozialforschung, which is part of 
GESIS as well). Scientific use files for other HIS data on the university sector will follow.   3 
 
The RatSWD has also been successful in the area of vocational training data. Federal and 
state  research  data  centers  now  provide  scientific  use  files  of  data  on  continuing 
vocational  training  from  the  European  surveys.  Furthermore,  the  German  Science 
Council’s evaluation (Wissenschaftsrat), which included the two chairmen of the Council, 
of the Federal Institute for Vocational Training (BIBB: Bundesinstitut für Berufsbildung) 
has  resulted  in  plans  for  the  establishment  of  a  research  data  center  there.  This  will 
significantly improve access for external researchers to the BIBB’s data on vocational 
training. 
 
In the field of health data, a promising relationship has been established to the Robert 
Koch Institute (RKI). The ongoing dialogue of RatSWD with RKI has revealed that the 
problem here is not so much one of limited access to data as one of limited use of the 
available health data by researchers. In fact, the data situation in the health sector is much 
better than originally assumed, but what is still lacking is an exchange of information 
between health researchers on the one hand and empirical social and economic scientists 
on the other. Future work of the RatSWD will focus on disseminating information and 
lobbying in this area. 
 
To explore possibilities for improving access to corporate and financial market data, the 
RatSWD held talks with representatives of the Deutsche Bundesbank and Kreditanstalt 
für Wiederaufbau (KfW). Although not impossible in the future, at present there are no 
concrete plans for offering the kind of user-friendly data access provided by research data 
and data service centers. However, external researchers can work with the data as guests 
of these institutions on project-related visits. The RatSWD therefore recommends that 
these opportunities be publicized, and in the case of KfW, that specific data be handed 
over to the Central Archive in Cologne. 
 
In the fields of media data and the statistics on crime and justice, two thematic workshops 
were held to gain an overview of the data stocks available and their analytical potential, 
and to ensure data access and identify further data needs. Participants in these workshops 
included experts from important research, data production and policy areas.  
 
Challenges 
The RatSWD’s central goals for the short and medium term fall into three main areas: 
providing  a  strong  and  permanent  foundation  for  the  data  infrastructure  in  Germany, 
further improving the data situation in the economic and social sciences, and bringing data 
production  in  the  social  sciences  to  the  top  level  internationally,  which  also  entails 
participation in national and transnational planning processes. 
 
Of immediate relevance, firstly, is the need to find creative solutions to institutionalizing 
and financing these modern data centers. The evaluation of research data centers and data 
service centers has now been completed and the BMBF project funding is coming to an 
end.  The  first  measurable  success  in  providing  a  permanent  funding  for  the  data 
infrastructure  was  the  transformation  of  the  Federal  Labour  Agency’s  Research  Data 
Center, located at the Institute for Employment Research (IAB), into a regular department 
of this agency. 
 
To further improve the data situation for the social sciences and economics, the RatSWD 
has activities planned for various areas of data production. Efforts will be continued to   4 
open up data sources that possess great potential but have not been systematized thus far, 
particularly in the areas of education and health. Moreover, the RatSWD is backing plans 
for  the  establishment  of  a  regular  national  election  study  (Nationale  Wahlstudie)  – 
currently missing in Germany – that has the potential to offer important data for political 
science research. 
 
Furthermore, the RatSWD will continue cultivating dialogue with professional scientific 
organizations (Fachgesellschaften). The exchange of experiences and ideas with scientific 
fields which are not represented on the Council and with representatives of other data-
producing facilities (e.g. the Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research in 
Karlsruhe)  has  proven  immensely  fruitful.  Future  plans  also  include  devoting  more 
attention  to  the  improved  access  to  data  from  federal  ministerial  research  facilities 
(Ressortforschungseinrichtungen),  an  issue  currently  being  discussed  by  the  German 
Science Council.  
 
Overall, however, the RatSWD aims to shift its main focus from increasing data access to 
improving data production and data quality. This goal set the agenda for a workshop held 
in March 2007 entitled “The Influence of the Science Community on the Compilation of 
the  Official  Statistics  with  the  2010/2011  Census  as  Example”.  Here,  participants 
discussed whether and how the research community can legitimately and systematically 
influence the compilation of data for official statistics. Their conclusion was that work 
would be required within each of the individual research disciplines to achieve a common 
understanding and efficient census approach. Monitoring of this process is to be carried 
out by scientific organizations and initiated by the RatSWD. With regard to the need to 
ensure high-quality data reflecting complex social interrelations, the workshop dealt in 
depth  with  possibilities  for  combining  various  data  sources  and  the  resulting 
methodological, legal and ethical issues.  
 
However, an improved statistical infrastructure is needed not only on the national level. 
As the European research landscape evolves, it produces increased demands on the data 
infrastructure in order for the social sciences and economics to develop their full potential 
in  the  area  of  social  comparisons  as  well.  By  actively  participating  in  important 
developments at both the national and international levels, the RatSWD intends to work 
even more intensively in this important field in the future. It already provides a platform 
for a fundamental discussion and planning process that is almost one of a kind both in 
Europe  and  beyond.  If  international  and  interdisciplinary  strategic  planning  is  to  be 
successful  in  fostering  empirical  research  and  improving  the  research  infrastructure, 
however, greater involvement of the professional scientific organizations representing the 
social sciences and economics will be urgently needed. The RatSWD will endeavor to 
promote this involvement. 
 
European research infrastructures have played an important role in the natural sciences for 
some  time.  The  CERN  nuclear  research  center  may  be  the  most  prominent  example, 
having been founded as early as 1954. In the humanities and other disciplines such as 
cultural studies, however, this tradition is almost entirely lacking. The same cannot be 
said for the social sciences—including economics—but the few infrastructure facilities 
that do exist (especially ESS: European Social Survey and SHARE) in these fields of 
research on both the national and international level do not display a unified, systematic 
approach.  
   5 
To remedy this problem, the European Union (EU) has now accelerated the systematic 
planning  process  with  the  European  Roadmap  for  Research  Infrastructures 
(ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/esfri/docs/esfri-roadmap-report-26092006_en.pdf).  The 
RatSWD was set up at an opportune moment to take advantage of this development, but 
most of the process of discussion and planning still remains to be done by the RatSWD, 
the  statistical  offices,  and  the  scientific  community  within  the  social  sciences  and 
economics.  The  first  important  step  in  this  direction  could,  for  example,  be  the 
organization  of  an  international  conference  offering  prominent  representatives  of  the 
social and economic research community a forum for dialogue on the strategic direction 
of empirical research and the data infrastructure necessary. 
 
To better understand what would be required for this strategic planning process to succeed 
in  Germany,  a  commitment  of  support  from  the  professional  scientific  organizations 
(Fachgesellschaften) will also be needed. In this context it will be important to recall that 
since 2006, the German Science Council has not only had the task of evaluating “large-
scale  scientific  instruments”  but  also  of  evaluating  and  if  necessary  making 
recommendations for “research infrastructures” within the hard sciences in all disciplines. 
As  in  the  two  areas  outlined  above,  it  is  evident  that  the  RatSWD  is  performing  an 
important function at the nexus of research and data production here as well. To ensure 
that  these  efforts  bear  fruit,  the  strategic  involvement  of  professional  scientific 
organizations representing the entire spectrum of the social sciences will be essential. 
 

A Modern Statistical Infrastructure for Excellent Research and Policy Advice – Report on the German Council for Social and Economic Data during its First Period in Office (2004 - 2006)

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A Modern Statistical Infrastructure for Excellent Research and Policy Advice – Report on the German Council for Social and Economic Data during its First Period in Office (2004 - 2006)

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