Hello, several months ago performed a download with the 1% 2022 ACS. I’ve recently performed a similar download to eliminate variables I didn’t end up using. However, I get mismatches across the met2013 variable for many observations.
I saw a note about updated geographical variables / updated met2013 variable under the “data updates” page, but wanted to clarify that the change did apply to the 1% 2022 ACS (not just the 5%)?
Thank you!
MET2013 has not been updated in the 2022 1-year ACS file since the data was first released on November 21, 2023. I can provide further guidance if you could share additional details about the samples you are matching, your matching process, and which cases are not matching correctly.
It may be relevant to note that the Census Bureau introduced revised Public Use Microdata Area (PUMA) boundaries in 2022, which affected identification of MET2013 (see the description and comparability tabs for MET2013). Whereas ACS data collected from 2012-2021 used 2010 Census based PUMA boundaries, data collected from 2022-onwards reports household residence using 2020 Census based PUMAs. This results in some metropolitan areas that were identified in 2012-2021 not being identified in 2022, and vice versa. All households in the 2022 1-year file are identified with the new PUMA boundaries. In the 5-year file, respondents surveyed from 2018-2021 are identified with 2010 Census based boundaries, while those surveyed in 2022 (MULTYEAR = 2022) are identified using the new boundaries.
Hi Ivan,
Thanks for the response!
I downloaded data for 2011, 2012, 2021, and 2022 early this year or at the end of last year–I’ve recently re-downloaded the same years and didn’t include some unnecessary variables that I had included in the first download.
However, when I compare the files (with no cleaning beyond being processed with the IPUMS Stata prep code), I get a mismatch between observations for met2013 (“met2013: 363509 mismatches”). I have the same observations & other variables match up unless I did not include them in the new download.
If I do a full match by sample / serial / cbserial / pernum, the samples to match perfectly, and all mismatched observations come from 2022.
So, I’m not sure if I have perhaps made a mistake with the processing files I downloaded (e.g. I need to apply one for 2022 separately) and something like this creates the difference between the two downloads?
Thanks again for your help!
Thank you for bringing this issue to our attention. We have re-released data for 5 variables (CITY, MET2013, MET2023, MIGMET131, PWMET13) to improve the identification of a number of corresponding geographic areas. We have also updated CITYPOP and five “mismatch error” variables (CITYERR, MET2013ERR, MET2023ERR, MIGMET13ERR, PWMET13ERR) with corresponding revisions.
Users who previously downloaded any of these variables in a data extract with either the 2022 ACS 1-year or 5-year samples should resubmit their extract request(s) to obtain the corrected data. More information about this revision and the areas that it affects can be found in the September 4, 2024 revision history note.
To provide a little more context with Ivan’s response…
While investigating the question raised in the original post here, we identified two sets of issues:
We’d made widespread corrections to MET2013 on March 7, 2024, but had failed to document those changes in our Revision History. We have added information about those corrections now in our March 7 entry. This provides a direct answer to the original question: yes, MET2013 had changed! We regret our delay in reporting this.
There remained a smaller set of errors in MET2013 that had not yet been corrected, along with similar issues with the other variables noted in Ivan’s message. We corrected these newly discovered issues with an update on September 4, 2024. This is the update Ivan discussed.
Thanks again for bringing this to our attention!
