Can the data available on IPUMS alter?

USA
1

Hi,

A few years ago I worte a syntax prepering an analysis using the 1990, 2000 and 2010 census/ACS files. Back then, after running this syntax I saved only the post-coding files, after droping parts of the sample and variables (very foolish of me, I konw).

Wanting to recreate this analysis, I downloaded the same “raw” census data files again from IPUMS.

However, running the same syntax for back then on these newly downloaded files doesn’t give me the same end dataset (even number of cases left in the data is larger than in the file I created a few years back).

Therefore, my question is: Can the data available on IPUMS alter in some variables? Are newer versions of the data uploaded, correcting errors, missing values etc.?

Thank you very much for your time and effort!

2

The data on IPUMS-USA are constantly being updated and expanded. Our Errata and Revisions page is a great resource that informs users about what changes have been made with each data release. This page is not exhaustive, but it does record things like census updates to original data files, changed variable codes and labels, corrected errors, and the addition of new samples and variables. Your data extract can differ from what downloaded a few years ago, but the differences are from data improvements. As you try to figure out what changes are impacting your sub-sample, please let us know if we can help.