When I create a custom dataset with the 2016 ACS 5yr as the sample, and INCTOT and US2016C_PINCP as source variables, I see that the values for these variables tend to differ slightly for a given record. From the documentation for INCTOT, it appears as though US2016C_PINCP serves as the sole source variable, so could you help me understand why INCTOT values tend to be slightly higher than US2016C_PINCP?
Thank you!
Since you are using a multi-year file, all dollar amounts for INCTOT have been standardized to dollars as valued in the final year of data included in the file. These adjustments are solely made to INCTOT and not to the source variable. As such, it would make sense that the values are slightly different between the two, with INCTOT being slightly higher than US2016C_PINCP.
In multi-year files, MULTYEAR can be used to identify a respondent’s year of interview.
Great, thank you so much.